Apologies are in order — in a general way, to the readers of this blog for having failed to update it in recent months; and, more specifically, to Joey Myers.  Joey called Craven a couple weeks ago after having stumbled across Cravenomena.  In addition to saying some nice things about the blog, Joey wanted to direct Craven’s attention to his Flickr account, where he has literally dozens of amazing photos documenting a childhood (and adulthood) obviously misspent in the best way.

Do yourself a favor and head over to Joey’s Flickr collection to salivate over some amazing monster toys, paperbacks, album covers and other gorgeous artifacts of late 20th century psychotronic culture.

By the way, if Joey’s name sounds familiar to you (as it did to Craven) that might be because you are a punk rock or shockabilly aficionado.  Joey is a well-known rock n’ roll drummer and one of the founders of the band, Hayride to Hell.  (I don’t know if they took their name from the great Hoodoo Gurus song by that name, but more props to them if they did.)  Regular listeners to Craven’s radio show on KAFM will have likely heard Joey’s drums (alongside two of Craven’s favorite Billys —  X guitarist Billy Zoom and actor/children’s show host Billy Barty) on Deke Dickerson’s classic 1999 album, MORE MILLION SELLERS.

BTW, among the photos in Joey’s collection is a shot of the Lindy Loonies, the grotesque toy line referenced in the comments section of Craven’s post entitled “Nutty Mad Men.” Be sure and check it out.

Coming up in future weeks — Craven’s long gestating look back at the making of SHOCK! SHOCK! SHOCK! Among other things, you will learn how the actor who made Tony Soprano an unlikely sex symbol got his cinematic start as a sadistic orderly in a movie made for less than $2,000.  Watch for it!

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

Hayride to Toy Hell!

Here’s what’s coming up on SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on Friday, August 14.

This week’s show will begin, as usual, with the Mutant Pop Obituaries, our weekly nod to those celebrities and artists who have shuffled off this mortal coil during the past few weeks.  This week, we will pay tribute to (in no particular order):

• Les Paul, guitar god and recording pioneer
• Indian actor Murali
• Baatin, rapper with Detroit hip-hop act Slum Village
• Billy Lee Riley, rockabilly great
• Mike Seeger,banjoist and musical folklorist
• Indonesian overnight sensation Mbah Surip
• Andy Parle, drummer for alternative band Space
• British folk singer Stanley Robertson
• Oscar-winning screenwriter Budd Schulberg
• Bollywood composer Gulshan Bawra
• Willy DeVille, founder of late ’70s punk band Mink DeVille
• Renato Pagliari, who scored a 1980s hit as half of Renee and Renato
• Iconic film director/writer John Hughes
• Armenian singer Aram Tigran
  

Additionally, Craven will be playing new music by the like of Joe Pernice, Cheap Trick and Lightning Dust, as well as the usual ultra-super-mega-wide mix of pop music from many different eras and many different locales.

You can hear SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on kafmradio.org starting at 9 am (U.S. Mountain Time).

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

How High the Moon: August 14, 2009

Here’s what’s coming up on SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on Friday, July 24.

This week’s show will begin, as usual, with the Mutant Pop Obituaries, our weekly nod to those celebrities and artists who have shuffled off this mortal coil during the past few weeks.  This week, we will pay tribute to (in no particular order):

Walter Cronkite, famed American newscaster

• Hard-rocking Swedish bassist Marcel Jacob of Talisman

• Jerry Holland, Celtic fiddler extraordinaire
• Gordon Waller of Peter and Gordon fame
• Ria Brieffies of the ’80s Dutch girl group, Dolly Dots
• New Riders of the Purple Sage co-founder John “Marmaduke” Dawson
• Gidget, Taco Bell’s spokeschihuahua

Additionally, Craven will be playing new music by the like of Fiery Furnaces and Just Jack, as well as the usual genre-busting mix of pop music from many different eras and many different locales.

You can hear SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on kafmradio.org starting at 9 am (U.S. Mountain Time).

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

Yo Quiero Taco Bell: July 24, 2009

Here’s what’s coming up on SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on Friday, July 17.

This week’s show will begin, as usual, with the Mutant Pop Obituaries, our weekly nod to those celebrities and artists who have shuffled off this mortal coil during the past few weeks.  Death has been unusually inactive this week (at least as it pertains to celebrities), but still, we will be paying tribute to (in no particular order):

• Jim Reid, Scottish folk musician

• Dallas R. McKennon, who gave voice to both Gumby and Archie Andrews

Additionally, Craven will be playing new music by the likes of Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros, Just Jack and Bleu, and classic tracks by Emitt Rhodes and the Turtles.  We’ll also be featuring the usual skewed melange of punk, bubblegum and global pop, topped with a generous dollop of the strange.

You can hear SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on kafmradio.org starting at 9 am (U.S. Mountain Time).

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

Come Ride, Come Ride: July 17, 2009

Here’s what’s coming up on SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on Friday, July 10.

This week’s show will begin, as usual, with the Mutant Pop Obituaries, our weekly nod to those celebrities and artists who have shuffled off this mortal coil during the past few weeks. This week, we will be paying tribute to (in no particular order):

• Harve Presnell, musical theatre baritone and foul-mouthed FARGO father-in-law

• Karl Malden, Oscar-winning character actor

• Blues musician Jackie Washington

• Gale Storm, singer and actress

• Irish folk singer Rita Keane
  

• Bela Mukherjee, Bollywood singer

• Canadian pop singer Terry Black
  

• Pitchman Billy Mays
• Paranormal writer and “Mothman” chronicler John A. Keel
• Drake Levin, guitarist for Paul Revere & the Raiders
• Allen Klein, the man who really broke up the Beatles

Additionally, Craven will be playing the super- ultra- mega-wide variety of popular music you have come to expect on Friday mornings.

You can hear SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on kafmradio.org starting at 9 am (U.S. Mountain Time).

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

Where the Action Is: July 10, 2009

Here’s what’s coming up on SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on Friday, July 3.

It’s time for the 10th Annual Surfing & Spying Special! Every year, sometime around the 4th of July, Craven continues a tradition originated in 1982 by radio programmer Todd Rutt, by presenting three hours of surf rock and spy soundtrack music! This year, we’ll be hearing some timeless surf classics mixed in with more obscure reverb rockers and music to kill S.M.E.R.S.H. agents by.

That’s the 10th Annual Surfing and Spying Special on KAFM from 9 am to noon (U.S. Mountain Time). Be there for three hours of gremmies and Pussy Galore!

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

A Decade of Surfing & Spying: July 3, 2009

Here’s what’s coming up on SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on Friday, June 26.

This week’s show will begin, as usual, with the Mutant Pop Obituaries, our weekly nod to those celebrities and artists who have shuffled off this mortal coil during the past few weeks. This week, we will be paying tribute to (in no particular order):

• Michael Jackson, king of pop

• Ed McMahon, second banana extraordinaire

• Farrah Fawcett, actress and pinup model

• Sky Saxon, garage rocker

• Singer/songwriter Tim Krekel

• Steve Race, British composer and television emcee

• DAD’S ARMY actor Colin Bean

• Sarod master Ali Akbar Khan
  

Additionally, Craven will be playing the usual chimerical melange of power pop, ragtime, easy listening, noise rock and novelty tunes!

You can hear SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on kafmradio.org starting at 9 am (U.S. Mountain Time).

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

You Are Correct Sir!: June 26, 2009

Here’s what’s coming up on SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on Friday, June 19.

This week’s show will begin, as usual, with the Mutant Pop Obituaries, our weekly nod to those celebrities and artists who have shuffled off this mortal coil during the past few weeks. This week, we will be paying tribute to (in no particular order):

• Bob Bogle, guitarist/bassist/founding member of the Ventures

• Jesús Alfonso Miró, Cuban musical director of Los Muñequitos de Matanzas

• Techno producer Ian Loveday, a.k.a. Eon

• Jazz saxophonist Charlie Mariano

Additionally, Craven will be playing new music by the likes of the Dirty Projectors, Pets and Kim Lenz.  Also, we’ll hear some slightly older tracks from Rose Kemp and the Pigeon Detectives. We’ll also be featuring a special set of nerd songs. All this and the usual unholy marriage of psychedelia, new wave, country and sunshine pop, garnished liberally with cheese!

You can hear SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on kafmradio.org starting at 9 am (U.S. Mountain Time).

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

Nerd Alert!: June 19, 2009

By then, of course, America and this substance called plastic were deeply commingled in the throes of their fitful love affair.  The Walt Disney comedy, THE ABSENT-MINDED PROFESSOR, with its vivid and funny representation of the super-elastic miracle substance “flubber,” is a fairly typical Valentine from the Hollywood of 1960 to this marvelous, still new material that, like computer technology today, had quickly infiltrated nearly all other industries and changed forever the way business was done.

One industry thusly changed was the automotive industry.  In the ’50s, a rich entrepreneur from Cincinnati by the name of Powell Crosley revolutionized the business by offering kit body sports cars.  He provided chassis and plans; the buyer provided fiberglass and elbow grease.  These kits were advertised in automotive magazines and, although they appealed to only a small fraction of the car market, they proved very popular with devout auto buffs.  Within a decade, there was a thriving subculture of amateur car builders and designers.  A common procedure was to strip a standard “Big Three” auto down to the chassis and then rebuild the body out of fiberglass from custom designs.  Car design competition became a staple of auto shows.

George Barris was one man who quickly rose to the top of this milieu.  A dapper, small man with an instinctual understanding of the importance of appearance, he had formed Barris Kustoms in Lynnwood, California with his brother during the early years of the custom car craze, and soon began to tailor his work for nearby Hollywood.  By the end of the ’50s, Barris cars had already been featured in several films — mostly low-budget Mamie Van Doren potboilers and the like.  But late in the decade, Alfred Hitchcock hired Barris to do custom car work for NORTH BY NORTHWEST, and soon the big studio floodgates opened and Barris’ work was very much in demand.  Eventually, he would become the king of custom cars in television and film, building a fortune and continuing to provide special autos for big-budget productions into and throughout the ’90s.

Among his most famous creations are the Batmobile from the mid-’60s series, BATMAN; the Munster Koach from the absurd sitcom, THE MUNSTERS; the beloved Weinermobile used in Oscar Mayer commercials; and the jalopy truck driven in the ’60s by THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES.  (Barris would be called on many years later to recreate that vehicle for 1993’s cinematic reinvention of Jed Clampett and kin.)  He also designed special cars for many rock acts, including Elvis Presley, the Beach Boys, the Raspberries and Paul Revere & the Raiders.

As Barris established his formidable reputation during the ’50s and early ’60s, another man also rose to prominence in the world of custom car design.  This man and Barris often found themselves competing at car shows, essentially with just each other.  Like Barris, this man was known for his richly imaginative and playful car designs, and had won many trophies over the years.  But in every other way, there could be no two individuals more dissimilar than George Barris and Ed “Big Daddy” Roth.

Just to glance at their publicity photos from the era is telling.  A typical shot of Barris from the time showed him standing next to one of his newly designed vehicles — perhaps somewhat clenched, but sharply attired in suit and tie and usually accompanied by a pretty model.

And then there was Big Daddy.  A self-described “slob,” Roth was often photographed perched over his latest creation wearing a t-shirt or Hawaiian short-sleeved shirt — that is, when he was wearing a shirt at all.  He was just as likely to be posed with his big beer gut hanging over his pants, and paint — or plaster-of-paris — or oil — still coating his hands.  The one constant in photos of Big Daddy was the huge, goofy grin pasted across his lumpy mug — the grin of someone very much loving the work he was doing.

It wasn’t just temperament which divided Big Daddy and Barris.  They were also very different in how they approached custom car design.

For Barris, it was a profession.  He competed on the car show circuit for prestige and publicity, but at the end of the day, it was selling his automotive creations to studios and private buyers that put the bread on his table.

On the other hand, Big Daddy approached custom car design as an avocation.  He made his money selling drawings (usually of his most famous character, Rat Fink), signs and t-shirts at car shows, or doing pinstriping and custom paint work.  Although he competed with fierce pride in design competitions, he rarely sold his car creations.  They served more as publicity for his art.  Indeed, they often were his art.

Because of this essential difference, Barris never considered Roth as competition in the professional sense.  Still, both men found themselves often vying for the same trophy, and eventually began to perceive each other as competitive nemeses.  To Barris, Roth was a talented but annoying amateur who often stole accolades with his constant oneupsmanship.  To Roth (many of whose friends, in those days, were bikers and low-lifes), Barris was “the Man” — the best there was, sure, but still the Establishment.  Roth saw Barris as more P.R. than substance.  (”He had the stage presence to sell those 500-buck jobs for five grand,” Roth wrote of his competitor, years later.)  And if, in Barris, Roth saw “the Man,” then in himself, he saw the scrappy little guy who could — through the combination of ambition, hard work and fiberglass — bring the champion down.

And, thus, the stage was set for the War of the Air Cars.

It was Barris who lobbed the opening volley, when he unveiled his most recent creation, the X-PAC 400.  It was a so-called “ground effects” car that looked something like a manta ray tattooed with the stars and stripes.  Basically, it was a simple hovercraft.  It was designed with a plenum chamber that, when filled with air, allowed the car to float a few inches off the ground.  Barris built small thrusters into the sides of the X-PAC 400 which allowed it to be steered, after a fashion.  But it was never highly functional as a vehicle; instead, it was the simple, confident futurism of its upswept fins and low-to-the-ground profile which made Barris’ air car a hot rod show favorite.

Meanwhile, Big Daddy had also designed and built an air car.  He called it the Rotar (short for Roth Air Car), and it also featured a beautiful, spacey design with the same patriotic color scheme as Barris’ air car.  He often demonstrated the car at shows with the assistance of his friend, Ron Aguirre, who had established his own place in car designer history in 1959 when he was the first custom car designer to add hydraulic lifts to the lowrider cars then very popular with the Latino population in Southern California.

But as the Rotar and the X-PAC 400 began to go up against each other at car show after car show, Big Daddy promoted the improvements incorporated in his Rotar over Barris’ vehicle, such as his car’s higher lift capacity and its ability to work equally well on land or water.  This led Barris to begin to add features to his air car.  But it was a difficult balancing act — the more Barris added to his car, the more motors and batteries had to be stowed, and it was a constant challenge to keep the car floating.  With every improvement Barris made, Roth was at his heels with his own new feature.  It was as escalatory as the international arms race then dominating the headlines.

While Roth continued to loudly declare the superior capabilities of the Rotar, there were a few things he failed to mention in his public spiel.  Although he had initially designed the Rotar with V-twin engines, Big Daddy ultimately settled for two Triumph engines laid on their sides, each driving a high-pressure propeller.  The whole car looked great on the outside — but inside was a Goldbergian contraption jury-rigged from old parts and plywood.

It was, as they say, an accident waiting to happen.

And it did.  In 1964, at a car show held at Cobo Hall in Detroit, as Ron Aguirre was demonstrating the amazing Rotar before a crowd of wide-eyed car buffs, its crank snapped and the engines exploded, sending hot motor parts and a very deadly propeller slicing into the crowd of spectators.  Several people were hurt, some very seriously.

And that’s how the War of the Air Cars ended — not with a whimper, but with a bang.  In the years following the accident, Big Daddy admitted that Barris had won their epic struggle by virtue of better engineering.  The Rotar was eventually sold to George Goodrich, who was reportedly rebuilding it in the 1990s.  George Barris put his X-PAC 400 into storage, and eventually lost the car.  Roth, after another decade of hard living in Southern California, settled down in Utah in 1974, and joined the Church of Latter Day Saints.  During the ’80s and ’90s, he began to reapply himself to marketing Rat Fink and his other characters.

Big Daddy Roth passed away from a heart attack in April, 2001.  A true American original, and an artistic inspiration to fine artists like Robert Williams, his brash joie de vivre and even his underdog hubris made him an important name in the annals of American popular culture.

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

War of the Air Cars

Starting this week, Craven will endeavor to preview his Friday morning radio show, SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW every week on this site.

This week’s show will begin, as usual, with the Mutant Pop Obituaries, our weekly nod to those celebrities and artists who have shuffled off this mortal coil during the past few weeks. This week, we will be paying tribute to (in no particular order):

• Hugh Hopper, bassist for Soft Machine

• Huey Long, guitarist for the Ink Spots

• Singer-songwriter Jeff Hanson

• Martial arts actor Shi Kien

• Kenny Rankin, New York singer-songwriter

• Cuban music legend Ricardo Abreus of Los Papines

• Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section keyboardist Barry Beckett

• Del Monroe, “Seaman Kowalski” of TV’s VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA

Additionally, Craven will be playing new music by the likes of Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey, the Leftovers, Starlight Mints and Yoko Ono.  All this and the usual melange of pop, punk, folk and rock n’ roll!

You can hear SONGS FROM HERE AND THERE, THEN AND NOW on kafmradio.org starting at 9 am (U.S. Mountain Time).

Post from: Cravenomena © 2008, Craven Lovelace.

Preview for June 12, 2009