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GGACP keeps the summer vibe alive with this ENCORE of a 2014 interview with singer-actor and star of the "Beach Party" movie series, Frankie Avalon. In this episode, Frankie talks about breaking into show business as a child prodigy, receiving 12,000 pieces of fan mail per week and working alongside Hollywood greats Jack Benny, Jackie Gleason, Buster Keaton, Lucille Ball, and Groucho Marx. Also, Frankie looks back at his humble beginnings in South Philly, his years as a teen heartthrob and his decades-long friendship with onscreen love interest Annette Funicello. PLUS: Remembering "Skidoo"! “Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine”! Dueling Draculas! The Duke makes Laurence Harvey cry! And Cesar Romero and Arnold Stang hit a strip joint! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965) AIP Production #6578 Jeff and Cheryl fall through a trap door into a mad scientist's sexy lair in Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine.Directed by Norman TaurogScreenplay by Elwood Ullman and Robert KaufmanStory by James Hartford (James Nicholson)Produced by James H. Nicholson and Samuel Z. Arkoff Starring:Vincent Price as Dr. GoldfootFrankie Avalon as Craig GambleDwayne Hickman as Todd ArmstrongSusan Hart as DianeJack Mullaney as IgorFred Clark as D. J. PevneyAlberta Nelson as Reject No. 12Milton Frome as Motorcycle copHal Riddle as NewsvendorJoe Ploski as Cook Produced by American International Pictures. Find this movie available to rent on Apple TV+, Prime Video or Vudu.Follow the American International Podcast on Letterboxd and Instagram @aip_pod and on Facebook at facebook.com/AmericanInternationalPodcast.View the Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine trailer here.Our open and close includes clips from the following films/trailers: How to Make a Monster (1958), The Brain That Wouldn't Die (1962), I Was a Teenage Werewolf (1957), High School Hellcats (1958), Beach Blanket Bingo (1965), The Wild Angels (1966), It Conquered the World (1956), The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971), and Female Jungle (1955)
GGACP celebrates the birthday of actor, musician and Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Steven Van Zandt (b. November 22) by revisiting this fun, freewheeling conversation from 2020. In this episode, Steven talks about beloved kiddie show hosts, the glory days of Top 40 radio, the mystique of gangster movies, the Beatles' impact on popular culture and the Rat Pack's "connection" to the E Street Band. Also, Darlene Love mounts a comeback, Little Richard officiates a wedding, Ol' Blue Eyes covers Simon & Garfunkel and Steven remembers his dear friend James Gandolfini. PLUS: The Singing Nun! "Angels with Dirty Faces"! The genius of William Castle! "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine"! And Gilbert and Steven pay tribute to "The Nutty Professor"! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Between Metropolis and Star Wars lies a 50 year wasteland of terrible movie robots. Every week we rate the robot from a movie, if it gets a score of 7 out of 10 then we say that it is not a shit robot. Today, we slip on our gold bikinis and marvel at the movie that inspired the Austin Powers series. It's Dr Goldfoot and his fembots.WARNING! The S**t-bomb is sometimes uttered but nothing more. Twitter: @FiftyYOSRInsta: @FiftyYOSRTikTok: @FiftyYOSRNOTESDR GOLDFOOT & THE BIKINI MACHINE FILMhttps://archive.org/details/dr-goldfoot-and-the-bikini-machine_202205 SAMUEL Z. ARKOFFhttps://www.theguardian.com/news/2001/sep/27/guardianobituaries GRANDE DAME GUIGNOL CINEMA TOP 40https://www.imdb.com/list/ls076673511/ WHOEVER SLEW AUNTIE ROO TRAILERhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-1J4lGs4OE THE TURING TESThttps://plato.stanford.edu/entries/turing-test/ Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Wes and Nick watch this James Bond spoof that is ridiculous and campy 60s fun that might offend you!Plot:Dr. Goldfoot plans on taking over the world with his beautiful female robots, who seduce rich and powerful men. Robot #11/Diane is sent after millionaire Todd Armstrong. Secret agent Craig Gamble tries to stop the plot but ends up in the torture chamber with Armstrong. The parody of "The Pit and the Pendulum" is the highlight of the film which also includes bits by Annette Funicello, Harvey Lembeck, and Deborah Walley.Support the show:
There were a looooot of Bond parodies well before Mike Myers' misbehaving super agent hit the scene, so today we're covering an original Bond contemporary: Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine! Thanks to @jrwells82 on Twitter for the suggestion! Music: Codename Dougwood by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com/
Scott and Marty peek into the campy closets of one of cinema history's greatest frightmeisters, and discover that Vincent is great at any Price! Featuring real talk about:The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939, Dir. Michael Curtiz)Edward Scissorhands (1990, Dir. Tim Burton)Laura (1944, Dir. Otto Preminger)Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965, Dir. Norman Taurog) Follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, or Amazon Music.Visit us at slackandslashpod.comEmail us at slackandslash@gmail.com
The movie: Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965) Ian and Joshua explore the world of forgotten '60s parody with this strange mix of spy flick and beach party spectacular. They also debate the weight of gold and the importance of Vincent Price.
Episode one hundred and fifty-six of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at “I Was Made to Love Her", the early career of Stevie Wonder, and the Detroit riots of 1967. Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a twenty-minute bonus episode available, on "Groovin'" by the Young Rascals. Tilt Araiza has assisted invaluably by doing a first-pass edit, and will hopefully be doing so from now on. Check out Tilt's irregular podcasts at http://www.podnose.com/jaffa-cakes-for-proust and http://sitcomclub.com/ Resources As usual, I've put together a Mixcloud playlist of all the recordings excerpted in this episode. The best value way to get all of Stevie Wonder's early singles is this MP3 collection, which has the original mono single mixes of fifty-five tracks for a very reasonable price. For those who prefer physical media, this is a decent single-CD collection of his early work at a very low price indeed. As well as the general Motown information listed below, I've also referred to Signed, Sealed, and Delivered: The Soulful Journey of Stevie Wonder by Mark Ribowsky, which rather astonishingly is the only full-length biography of Wonder, to Higher Ground: Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Curtis Mayfield, and the Rise and Fall of American Soul by Craig Werner, and to Detroit 67: The Year That Changed Soul by Stuart Cosgrove. For Motown-related information in this and other Motown episodes, I've used the following resources: Where Did Our Love Go? The Rise and Fall of the Motown Sound by Nelson George is an excellent popular history of the various companies that became Motown. To Be Loved by Berry Gordy is Gordy's own, understandably one-sided, but relatively well-written, autobiography. Women of Motown: An Oral History by Susan Whitall is a collection of interviews with women involved in Motown. I Hear a Symphony: Motown and Crossover R&B by J. Andrew Flory is an academic look at Motown. The Motown Encyclopaedia by Graham Betts is an exhaustive look at the people and records involved in Motown's thirty-year history. How Sweet It Is by Lamont Dozier and Scott B. Bomar is Dozier's autobiography, while Come and Get These Memories by Brian and Eddie Holland and Dave Thompson is the Holland brothers'. Standing in the Shadows of Motown: The Life and Music of Legendary Bassist James Jamerson by "Dr Licks" is a mixture of a short biography of the great bass player, and tablature of his most impressive bass parts. And Motown Junkies is an infrequently-updated blog looking at (so far) the first 694 tracks released on Motown singles. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them? Transcript A quick note before I begin -- this episode deals with disability and racism, and also deals from the very beginning with sex work and domestic violence. It also has some discussion of police violence and sexual assault. As always I will try to deal with those subjects as non-judgementally and sensitively as possible, but if you worry that anything about those subjects might disturb you, please check the transcript. Calvin Judkins was not a good man. Lula Mae Hardaway thought at first he might be, when he took her in, with her infant son whose father had left before the boy was born. He was someone who seemed, when he played the piano, to be deeply sensitive and emotional, and he even did the decent thing and married her when he got her pregnant. She thought she could save him, even though he was a street hustler and not even very good at it, and thirty years older than her -- she was only nineteen, he was nearly fifty. But she soon discovered that he wasn't interested in being saved, and instead he was interested in hurting her. He became physically and financially abusive, and started pimping her out. Lula would eventually realise that Calvin Judkins was no good, but not until she got pregnant again, shortly after the birth of her second son. Her third son was born premature -- different sources give different numbers for how premature, with some saying four months and others six weeks -- and while he apparently went by Stevland Judkins throughout his early childhood, the name on his birth certificate was apparently Stevland Morris, Lula having decided not to give another child the surname of her abuser, though nobody has ever properly explained where she got the surname "Morris" from. Little Stevland was put in an incubator with an oxygen mask, which saved the tiny child's life but destroyed his sight, giving him a condition called retinopathy of prematurity -- a condition which nowadays can be prevented and cured, but in 1951 was just an unavoidable consequence for some portion of premature babies. Shortly after the family moved from Saginaw to Detroit, Lula kicked Calvin out, and he would remain only a peripheral figure in his children's lives, but one thing he did do was notice young Stevland's interest in music, and on his increasingly infrequent visits to his wife and kids -- visits that usually ended with violence -- he would bring along toy instruments for the young child to play, like a harmonica and a set of bongos. Stevie was a real prodigy, and by the time he was nine he had a collection of real musical instruments, because everyone could see that the kid was something special. A neighbour who owned a piano gave it to Stevie when she moved out and couldn't take it with her. A local Lions Club gave him a drum kit at a party they organised for local blind children, and a barber gave him a chromatic harmonica after seeing him play his toy one. Stevie gave his first professional performance when he was eight. His mother had taken him to a picnic in the park, and there was a band playing, and the little boy got as close to the stage as he could and started dancing wildly. The MC of the show asked the child who he was, and he said "My name is Stevie, and I can sing and play drums", so of course they got the cute kid up on stage behind the drum kit while the band played Johnny Ace's "Pledging My Love": [Excerpt: Johnny Ace, "Pledging My Love"] He did well enough that they paid him seventy-five cents -- an enormous amount for a small child at that time -- though he was disappointed afterwards that they hadn't played something faster that would really allow him to show off his drumming skills. After that he would perform semi-regularly at small events, and always ask to be paid in quarters rather than paper money, because he liked the sound of the coins -- one of his party tricks was to be able to tell one coin from another by the sound of them hitting a table. Soon he formed a duo with a neighbourhood friend, John Glover, who was a couple of years older and could play guitar while Stevie sang and played harmonica and bongos. The two were friends, and both accomplished musicians for their age, but that wasn't the only reason Stevie latched on to Glover. Even as young as he was, he knew that Motown was soon going to be the place to be in Detroit if you were a musician, and Glover had an in -- his cousin was Ronnie White of the Miracles. Stevie and John performed as a duo everywhere they could and honed their act, performing particularly at the talent shows which were such an incubator of Black musical talent at the time, and they also at this point seem to have got the attention of Clarence Paul, but it was White who brought the duo to Motown. Stevie and John first played for White and Bobby Rodgers, another of the Miracles, then when they were impressed they took them through the several layers of Motown people who would have to sign off on signing a new act. First they were taken to see Brian Holland, who was a rising star within Motown as "Please Mr. Postman" was just entering the charts. They impressed him with a performance of the Miracles song "Bad Girl": [Excerpt: The Miracles, "Bad Girl"] After that, Stevie and John went to see Mickey Stevenson, who was at first sceptical, thinking that a kid so young -- Stevie was only eleven at the time -- must be some kind of novelty act rather than a serious musician. He said later "It was like, what's next, the singing mouse?" But Stevenson was won over by the child's talent. Normally, Stevenson had the power to sign whoever he liked to the label, but given the extra legal complications involved in signing someone under-age, he had to get Berry Gordy's permission. Gordy didn't even like signing teenagers because of all the extra paperwork that would be involved, and he certainly wasn't interested in signing pre-teens. But he came down to the studio to see what Stevie could do, and was amazed, not by his singing -- Gordy didn't think much of that -- but by his instrumental ability. First Stevie played harmonica and bongos as proficiently as an adult professional, and then he made his way around the studio playing on every other instrument in the place -- often only a few notes, but competent on them all. Gordy decided to sign the duo -- and the initial contract was for an act named "Steve and John" -- but it was soon decided to separate them. Glover would be allowed to hang around Motown while he was finishing school, and there would be a place for him when he finished -- he later became a staff songwriter, working on tracks for the Four Tops and the Miracles among others, and he would even later write a number one hit, "You Don't Have to be a Star (to be in My Show)" for Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr -- but they were going to make Stevie a star right now. The man put in charge of that was Clarence Paul. Paul, under his birth name of Clarence Pauling, had started his career in the "5" Royales, a vocal group he formed with his brother Lowman Pauling that had been signed to Apollo Records by Ralph Bass, and later to King Records. Paul seems to have been on at least some of the earliest recordings by the group, so is likely on their first single, "Give Me One More Chance": [Excerpt: The "5" Royales, "Give Me One More Chance"] But Paul was drafted to go and fight in the Korean War, and so wasn't part of the group's string of hit singles, mostly written by his brother Lowman, like "Think", which later became better known in James Brown's cover version, or "Dedicated to the One I Love", later covered by the Shirelles, but in its original version dominated by Lowman's stinging guitar playing: [Excerpt: The "5" Royales, "Dedicated to the One I Love"] After being discharged, Clarence had shortened his name to Clarence Paul, and had started recording for all the usual R&B labels like Roulette and Federal, with little success: [Excerpt: Clarence Paul, "I'm Gonna Love You, Love You Til I Die"] He'd also co-written "I Need Your Lovin'", which had been an R&B hit for Roy Hamilton: [Excerpt: Roy Hamilton, "I Need Your Lovin'"] Paul had recently come to work for Motown – one of the things Berry Gordy did to try to make his label more attractive was to hire the relatives of R&B stars on other labels, in the hopes of getting them to switch to Motown – and he was the new man on the team, not given any of the important work to do. He was working with acts like Henry Lumpkin and the Valladiers, and had also been the producer of "Mind Over Matter", the single the Temptations had released as The Pirates in a desperate attempt to get a hit: [Excerpt: The Pirates, "Mind Over Matter"] Paul was the person you turned to when no-one else was interested, and who would come up with bizarre ideas. A year or so after the time period we're talking about, it was him who produced an album of country music for the Supremes, before they'd had a hit, and came up with "The Man With the Rock and Roll Banjo Band" for them: [Excerpt: The Supremes, "The Man With The Rock and Roll Banjo Band"] So, Paul was the perfect person to give a child -- by this time twelve years old -- who had the triple novelties of being a multi-instrumentalist, a child, and blind. Stevie started spending all his time around the Motown studios, partly because he was eager to learn everything about making records and partly because his home life wasn't particularly great and he wanted to be somewhere else. He earned the affection and irritation, in equal measure, of people at Motown both for his habit of wandering into the middle of sessions because he couldn't see the light that showed that the studio was in use, and for his practical joking. He was a great mimic, and would do things like phoning one of the engineers and imitating Berry Gordy's voice, telling the engineer that Stevie would be coming down, and to give him studio equipment to take home. He'd also astonish women by complimenting them, in detail, on their dresses, having been told in advance what they looked like by an accomplice. But other "jokes" were less welcome -- he would regularly sexually assault women working at Motown, grabbing their breasts or buttocks and then claiming it was an accident because he couldn't see what he was doing. Most of the women he molested still speak of him fondly, and say everybody loved him, and this may even be the case -- and certainly I don't think any of us should be judged too harshly for what we did when we were twelve -- but this kind of thing led to a certain amount of pressure to make Stevie's career worth the extra effort he was causing everyone at Motown. Because Berry Gordy was not impressed with Stevie's vocals, the decision was made to promote him as a jazz instrumentalist, and so Clarence Paul insisted that his first release be an album, rather than doing what everyone would normally do and only put out an album after a hit single. Paul reasoned that there was no way on Earth they were going to be able to get a hit single with a jazz instrumental by a twelve-year-old kid, and eventually persuaded Gordy of the wisdom of this idea. So they started work on The Jazz Soul of Little Stevie, released under his new stagename of Little Stevie Wonder, supposedly a name given to him after Berry Gordy said "That kid's a wonder!", though Mickey Stevenson always said that the name came from a brainstorming session between him and Clarence Paul. The album featured Stevie on harmonica, piano, and organ on different tracks, but on the opening track, "Fingertips", he's playing the bongos that give the track its name: [Excerpt: Little Stevie Wonder, "Fingertips (studio version)"] The composition of that track is credited to Paul and the arranger Hank Cosby, but Beans Bowles, who played flute on the track, always claimed that he came up with the melody, and it seems quite likely to me that most of the tracks on the album were created more or less as jam sessions -- though Wonder's contributions were all overdubbed later. The album sat in the can for several months -- Berry Gordy was not at all sure of its commercial potential. Instead, he told Paul to go in another direction -- focusing on Wonder's blindness, he decided that what they needed to do was create an association in listeners' minds with Ray Charles, who at this point was at the peak of his commercial power. So back into the studio went Wonder and Paul, to record an album made up almost entirely of Ray Charles covers, titled Tribute to Uncle Ray. (Some sources have the Ray Charles tribute album recorded first -- and given Motown's lax record-keeping at this time it may be impossible to know for sure -- but this is the way round that Mark Ribowsky's biography of Wonder has it). But at Motown's regular quality control meeting it was decided that there wasn't a single on the album, and you didn't release an album like that without having a hit single first. By this point, Clarence Paul was convinced that Berry Gordy was just looking for excuses not to do anything with Wonder -- and there may have been a grain of truth to that. There's some evidence that Gordy was worried that the kid wouldn't be able to sing once his voice broke, and was scared of having another Frankie Lymon on his hands. But the decision was made that rather than put out either of those albums, they would put out a single. The A-side was a song called "I Call it Pretty Music But the Old People Call it the Blues, Part 1", which very much played on Wonder's image as a loveable naive kid: [Excerpt: Little Stevie Wonder, "I Call it Pretty Music But the Old People Call it the Blues, Part 1"] The B-side, meanwhile, was part two -- a slowed-down, near instrumental, version of the song, reframed as an actual blues, and as a showcase for Wonder's harmonica playing rather than his vocals. The single wasn't a hit, but it made number 101 on the Billboard charts, just missing the Hot One Hundred, which for the debut single of a new artist wasn't too bad, especially for Motown at this point in time, when most of its releases were flopping. That was good enough that Gordy authorised the release of the two albums that they had in the can. The next single, "Little Water Boy", was a rather baffling duet with Clarence Paul, which did nothing at all on the charts. [Excerpt: Clarence Paul and Little Stevie Wonder, "Little Water Boy"] After this came another flop single, written by Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier, and Janie Bradford, before the record that finally broke Little Stevie Wonder out into the mainstream in a big way. While Wonder hadn't had a hit yet, he was sent out on the first Motortown Revue tour, along with almost every other act on the label. Because he hadn't had a hit, he was supposed to only play one song per show, but nobody had told him how long that song should be. He had quickly become a great live performer, and the audiences were excited to watch him, so when he went into extended harmonica solos rather than quickly finishing the song, the audience would be with him. Clarence Paul, who came along on the tour, would have to motion to the onstage bandleader to stop the music, but the bandleader would know that the audiences were with Stevie, and so would just keep the song going as long as Stevie was playing. Often Paul would have to go on to the stage and shout in Wonder's ear to stop playing -- and often Wonder would ignore him, and have to be physically dragged off stage by Paul, still playing, causing the audience to boo Paul for stopping him from playing. Wonder would complain off-stage that the audience had been enjoying it, and didn't seem to get it into his head that he wasn't the star of the show, that the audiences *were* enjoying him, but were *there* to see the Miracles and Mary Wells and the Marvelettes and Marvin Gaye. This made all the acts who had to go on after him, and who were running late as a result, furious at him -- especially since one aspect of Wonder's blindness was that his circadian rhythms weren't regulated by sunlight in the same way that the sighted members of the tour's were. He would often wake up the entire tour bus by playing his harmonica at two or three in the morning, while they were all trying to sleep. Soon Berry Gordy insisted that Clarence Paul be on stage with Wonder throughout his performance, ready to drag him off stage, so that he wouldn't have to come out onto the stage to do it. But one of the first times he had done this had been on one of the very first Motortown Revue shows, before any of his records had come out. There he'd done a performance of "Fingertips", playing the flute part on harmonica rather than only playing bongos throughout as he had on the studio version -- leaving the percussion to Marvin Gaye, who was playing drums for Wonder's set: [Excerpt: Little Stevie Wonder, "Fingertips (Parts 1 & 2)"] But he'd extended the song with a little bit of call-and-response vocalising: [Excerpt: Little Stevie Wonder, "Fingertips (Parts 1 & 2)"] After the long performance ended, Clarence Paul dragged Wonder off-stage and the MC asked the audience to give him a round of applause -- but then Stevie came running back on and carried on playing: [Excerpt: Little Stevie Wonder, "Fingertips (Parts 1 & 2)"] By this point, though, the musicians had started to change over -- Mary Wells, who was on after Wonder, was using different musicians from his, and some of her players were already on stage. You can hear Joe Swift, who was playing bass for Wells, asking what key he was meant to be playing in: [Excerpt: Little Stevie Wonder, "Fingertips (Parts 1 & 2)"] Eventually, after six and a half minutes, they got Wonder off stage, but that performance became the two sides of Wonder's next single, with "Fingertips Part 2", the part with the ad lib singing and the false ending, rather than the instrumental part one, being labelled as the side the DJs should play. When it was released, the song started a slow climb up the charts, and by August 1963, three months after it came out, it was at number one -- only the second ever Motown number one, and the first ever live single to get there. Not only that, but Motown released a live album -- Recorded Live, the Twelve-Year-Old Genius (though as many people point out he was thirteen when it was released -- he was twelve when it was recorded though) and that made number one on the albums chart, becoming the first Motown album ever to do so. They followed up "Fingertips" with a similar sounding track, "Workout, Stevie, Workout", which made number thirty-three. After that, his albums -- though not yet his singles -- started to be released as by "Stevie Wonder" with no "Little" -- he'd had a bit of a growth spurt and his voice was breaking, and so marketing him as a child prodigy was not going to work much longer and they needed to transition him into a star with adult potential. In the Motown of 1963 that meant cutting an album of standards, because the belief at the time in Motown was that the future for their entertainers was doing show tunes at the Copacabana. But for some reason the audience who had wanted an R&B harmonica instrumental with call-and-response improvised gospel-influenced yelling was not in the mood for a thirteen year old singing "Put on a Happy Face" and "When You Wish Upon a Star", and especially not when the instrumental tracks were recorded in a key that suited him at age twelve but not thirteen, so he was clearly straining. "Fingertips" being a massive hit also meant Stevie was now near the top of the bill on the Motortown Revue when it went on its second tour. But this actually put him in a precarious position. When he had been down at the bottom of the bill and unknown, nobody expected anything from him, and he was following other minor acts, so when he was surprisingly good the audiences went wild. Now, near the top of the bill, he had to go on after Marvin Gaye, and he was not nearly so impressive in that context. The audiences were polite enough, but not in the raptures he was used to. Although Stevie could still beat Gaye in some circumstances. At Motown staff parties, Berry Gordy would always have a contest where he'd pit two artists against each other to see who could win the crowd over, something he thought instilled a fun and useful competitive spirit in his artists. They'd alternate songs, two songs each, and Gordy would decide on the winner based on audience response. For the 1963 Motown Christmas party, it was Stevie versus Marvin. Wonder went first, with "Workout, Stevie, Workout", and was apparently impressive, but then Gaye topped him with a version of "Hitch-Hike". So Stevie had to top that, and apparently did, with a hugely extended version of "I Call it Pretty Music", reworked in the Ray Charles style he'd used for "Fingertips". So Marvin Gaye had to top that with the final song of the contest, and he did, performing "Stubborn Kind of Fellow": [Excerpt: Marvin Gaye, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow"] And he was great. So great, it turned the crowd against him. They started booing, and someone in the audience shouted "Marvin, you should be ashamed of yourself, taking advantage of a little blind kid!" The crowd got so hostile Berry Gordy had to stop the performance and end the party early. He never had another contest like that again. There were other problems, as well. Wonder had been assigned a tutor, a young man named Ted Hull, who began to take serious control over his life. Hull was legally blind, so could teach Wonder using Braille, but unlike Wonder had some sight -- enough that he was even able to get a drivers' license and a co-pilot license for planes. Hull was put in loco parentis on most of Stevie's tours, and soon became basically inseparable from him, but this caused a lot of problems, not least because Hull was a conservative white man, while almost everyone else at Motown was Black, and Stevie was socially liberal and on the side of the civil rights and anti-Vietnam movements. Hull started to collaborate on songwriting with Wonder, which most people at Motown were OK with but which now seems like a serious conflict of interest, and he also started calling himself Stevie's "manager" -- which did *not* impress the people at Motown, who had their own conflict of interest because with Stevie, like with all their artists, they were his management company and agents as well as his record label and publishers. Motown grudgingly tolerated Hull, though, mostly because he was someone they could pass Lula Mae Hardaway to to deal with her complaints. Stevie's mother was not very impressed with the way that Motown were handling her son, and would make her opinion known to anyone who would listen. Hull and Hardaway did not get on at all, but he could be relied on to save the Gordy family members from having to deal with her. Wonder was sent over to Europe for Christmas 1963, to perform shows at the Paris Olympia and do some British media appearances. But both his mother and Hull had come along, and their clear dislike for each other was making him stressed. He started to get pains in his throat whenever he sang -- pains which everyone assumed were a stress reaction to the unhealthy atmosphere that happened whenever Hull and his mother were in the same room together, but which later turned out to be throat nodules that required surgery. Because of this, his singing was generally not up to standard, which meant he was moved to a less prominent place on the bill, which in turn led to his mother accusing the Gordy family of being against him and trying to stop him becoming a star. Wonder started to take her side and believe that Motown were conspiring against him, and at one point he even "accidentally" dropped a bottle of wine on Ted Hull's foot, breaking one of his toes, because he saw Hull as part of the enemy that was Motown. Before leaving for those shows, he had recorded the album he later considered the worst of his career. While he was now just plain Stevie on albums, he wasn't for his single releases, or in his first film appearance, where he was still Little Stevie Wonder. Berry Gordy was already trying to get a foot in the door in Hollywood -- by the end of the decade Motown would be moving from Detroit to LA -- and his first real connections there were with American International Pictures, the low-budget film-makers who have come up a lot in connection with the LA scene. AIP were the producers of the successful low-budget series of beach party films, which combined appearances by teen heartthrobs Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello in swimsuits with cameo appearances by old film stars fallen on hard times, and with musical performances by bands like the Bobby Fuller Four. There would be a couple of Motown connections to these films -- most notably, the Supremes would do the theme tune for Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine -- but Muscle Beach Party was to be the first. Most of the music for Muscle Beach Party was written by Brian Wilson, Roger Christian, and Gary Usher, as one might expect for a film about surfing, and was performed by Dick Dale and the Del-Tones, the film's major musical guests, with Annette, Frankie, and Donna Loren [pron Lorren] adding vocals, on songs like "Muscle Bustle": [Excerpt: Donna Loren with Dick Dale and the Del-Tones, "Muscle Bustle"] The film followed the formula in every way -- it also had a cameo appearance by Peter Lorre, his last film appearance before his death, and it featured Little Stevie Wonder playing one of the few songs not written by the surf and car writers, a piece of nothing called "Happy Street". Stevie also featured in the follow-up, Bikini Beach, which came out a little under four months later, again doing a single number, "Happy Feelin'". To cash in on his appearances in these films, and having tried releasing albums of Little Stevie as jazz multi-instrumentalist, Ray Charles tribute act, live soulman and Andy Williams-style crooner, they now decided to see if they could sell him as a surf singer. Or at least, as Motown's idea of a surf singer, which meant a lot of songs about the beach and the sea -- mostly old standards like "Red Sails in the Sunset" and "Ebb Tide" -- backed by rather schlocky Wrecking Crew arrangements. And this is as good a place as any to take on one of the bits of disinformation that goes around about Motown. I've addressed this before, but it's worth repeating here in slightly more detail. Carol Kaye, one of the go-to Wrecking Crew bass players, is a known credit thief, and claims to have played on hundreds of records she didn't -- claims which too many people take seriously because she is a genuine pioneer and was for a long time undercredited on many records she *did* play on. In particular, she claims to have played on almost all the classic Motown hits that James Jamerson of the Funk Brothers played on, like the title track for this episode, and she claims this despite evidence including notarised statements from everyone involved in the records, the release of session recordings that show producers talking to the Funk Brothers, and most importantly the evidence of the recordings themselves, which have all the characteristics of the Detroit studio and sound like the Funk Brothers playing, and have absolutely nothing in common, sonically, with the records the Wrecking Crew played on at Gold Star, Western, and other LA studios. The Wrecking Crew *did* play on a lot of Motown records, but with a handful of exceptions, mostly by Brenda Holloway, the records they played on were quickie knock-off album tracks and potboiler albums made to tie in with film or TV work -- soundtracks to TV specials the acts did, and that kind of thing. And in this case, the Wrecking Crew played on the entire Stevie at the Beach album, including the last single to be released as by "Little Stevie Wonder", "Castles in the Sand", which was arranged by Jack Nitzsche: [Excerpt: Little Stevie Wonder, "Castles in the Sand"] Apparently the idea of surfin' Stevie didn't catch on any more than that of swingin' Stevie had earlier. Indeed, throughout 1964 and 65 Motown seem to have had less than no idea what they were doing with Stevie Wonder, and he himself refers to all his recordings from this period as an embarrassment, saving particular scorn for the second single from Stevie at the Beach, "Hey Harmonica Man", possibly because that, unlike most of his other singles around this point, was a minor hit, reaching number twenty-nine on the charts. Motown were still pushing Wonder hard -- he even got an appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show in May 1964, only the second Motown act to appear on it after the Marvelettes -- but Wonder was getting more and more unhappy with the decisions they were making. He loathed the Stevie at the Beach album -- the records he'd made earlier, while patchy and not things he'd chosen, were at least in some way related to his musical interests. He *did* love jazz, and he *did* love Ray Charles, and he *did* love old standards, and the records were made by his friend Clarence Paul and with the studio musicians he'd grown to know in Detroit. But Stevie at the Beach was something that was imposed on Clarence Paul from above, it was cut with unfamiliar musicians, Stevie thought the films he was appearing in were embarrassing, and he wasn't even having much commercial success, which was the whole point of these compromises. He started to get more rebellious against Paul in the studio, though many of these decisions weren't made by Paul, and he would complain to anyone who would listen that if he was just allowed to do the music he wanted to sing, the way he wanted to sing it, he would have more hits. But for nine months he did basically no singing other than that Ed Sullivan Show appearance -- he had to recover from the operation to remove the throat nodules. When he did return to the studio, the first single he cut remained unreleased, and while some stuff from the archives was released between the start of 1964 and March 1965, the first single he recorded and released after the throat nodules, "Kiss Me Baby", which came out in March, was a complete flop. That single was released to coincide with the first Motown tour of Europe, which we looked at in the episode on "Stop! In the Name of Love", and which was mostly set up to promote the Supremes, but which also featured Martha and the Vandellas, the Miracles, and the Temptations. Even though Stevie had not had a major hit in eighteen months by this point, he was still brought along on the tour, the only solo artist to be included -- at this point Gordy thought that solo artists looked outdated compared to vocal groups, in a world dominated by bands, and so other solo artists like Marvin Gaye weren't invited. This was a sign that Gordy was happier with Stevie than his recent lack of chart success might suggest. One of the main reasons that Gordy had been in two minds about him was that he'd had no idea if Wonder would still be able to sing well after his voice broke. But now, as he was about to turn fifteen, his adult voice had more or less stabilised, and Gordy knew that he was capable of having a long career, if they just gave him the proper material. But for now his job on the tour was to do his couple of hits, smile, and be on the lower rungs of the ladder. But even that was still a prominent place to be given the scaled-down nature of this bill compared to the Motortown Revues. While the tour was in England, for example, Dusty Springfield presented a TV special focusing on all the acts on the tour, and while the Supremes were the main stars, Stevie got to do two songs, and also took part in the finale, a version of "Mickey's Monkey" led by Smokey Robinson but with all the performers joining in, with Wonder getting a harmonica solo: [Excerpt: Smokey Robinson and the Motown acts, "Mickey's Monkey"] Sadly, there was one aspect of the trip to the UK that was extremely upsetting for Wonder. Almost all the media attention he got -- which was relatively little, as he wasn't a Supreme -- was about his blindness, and one reporter in particular convinced him that there was an operation he could have to restore his sight, but that Motown were preventing him from finding out about it in order to keep his gimmick going. He was devastated about this, and then further devastated when Ted Hull finally convinced him that it wasn't true, and that he'd been lied to. Meanwhile other newspapers were reporting that he *could* see, and that he was just feigning blindness to boost his record sales. After the tour, a live recording of Wonder singing the blues standard "High Heeled Sneakers" was released as a single, and barely made the R&B top thirty, and didn't hit the top forty on the pop charts. Stevie's initial contract with Motown was going to expire in the middle of 1966, so there was a year to get him back to a point where he was having the kind of hits that other Motown acts were regularly getting at this point. Otherwise, it looked like his career might end by the time he was sixteen. The B-side to "High Heeled Sneakers" was another duet with Clarence Paul, who dominates the vocal sound for much of it -- a version of Willie Nelson's country classic "Funny How Time Slips Away": [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder and Clarence Paul, "Funny How Time Slips Away"] There are a few of these duet records scattered through Wonder's early career -- we'll hear another one a little later -- and they're mostly dismissed as Paul trying to muscle his way into a revival of his own recording career as an artist, and there may be some truth in that. But they're also a natural extension of the way the two of them worked in the studio. Motown didn't have the facilities to give Wonder Braille lyric sheets, and Paul didn't trust him to be able to remember the lyrics, so often when they made a record, Paul would be just off-mic, reciting the lyrics to Wonder fractionally ahead of him singing them. So it was more or less natural that this dynamic would leak out onto records, but not everyone saw it that way. But at the same time, there has been some suggestion that Paul was among those manoeuvring to get rid of Wonder from Motown as soon as his contract was finished -- despite the fact that Wonder was the only act Paul had worked on any big hits for. Either way, Paul and Wonder were starting to chafe at working with each other in the studio, and while Paul remained his on-stage musical director, the opportunity to work on Wonder's singles for what would surely be his last few months at Motown was given to Hank Cosby and Sylvia Moy. Cosby was a saxophone player and staff songwriter who had been working with Wonder and Paul for years -- he'd co-written "Fingertips" and several other tracks -- while Moy was a staff songwriter who was working as an apprentice to Cosby. Basically, at this point, nobody else wanted the job of writing for Wonder, and as Moy was having no luck getting songs cut by any other artists and her career was looking about as dead as Wonder's, they started working together. Wonder was, at this point, full of musical ideas but with absolutely no discipline. He's said in interviews that at this point he was writing a hundred and fifty songs a month, but these were often not full songs -- they were fragments, hooks, or a single verse, or a few lines, which he would pass on to Moy, who would turn his ideas into structured songs that fit the Motown hit template, usually with the assistance of Cosby. Then Cosby would come up with an arrangement, and would co-produce with Mickey Stevenson. The first song they came up with in this manner was a sign of how Wonder was looking outside the world of Motown to the rock music that was starting to dominate the US charts -- but which was itself inspired by Motown music. We heard in the last episode on the Rolling Stones how "Nowhere to Run" by the Vandellas: [Excerpt: Martha and the Vandellas, "Nowhere to Run"] had inspired the Stones' "Satisfaction": [Excerpt: The Rolling Stones, "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"] And Wonder in turn was inspired by "Satisfaction" to come up with his own song -- though again, much of the work making it into an actual finished song was done by Sylvia Moy. They took the four-on-the-floor beat and basic melody of "Satisfaction" and brought it back to Motown, where those things had originated -- though they hadn't originated with Stevie, and this was his first record to sound like a Motown record in the way we think of those things. As a sign of how, despite the way these stories are usually told, the histories of rock and soul were completely and complexly intertwined, that four-on-the-floor beat itself was a conscious attempt by Holland, Dozier, and Holland to appeal to white listeners -- on the grounds that while Black people generally clapped on the backbeat, white people didn't, and so having a four-on-the-floor beat wouldn't throw them off. So Cosby, Moy, and Wonder, in trying to come up with a "Satisfaction" soundalike were Black Motown writers trying to copy a white rock band trying to copy Black Motown writers trying to appeal to a white rock audience. Wonder came up with the basic chorus hook, which was based around a lot of current slang terms he was fond of: [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "Uptight"] Then Moy, with some assistance from Cosby, filled it out into a full song. Lyrically, it was as close to social comment as Motown had come at this point -- Wonder was, like many of his peers in soul music, interested in the power of popular music to make political statements, and he would become a much more political artist in the next few years, but at this point it's still couched in the acceptable boy-meets-girl romantic love song that Motown specialised in. But in 1965 a story about a boy from the wrong side of the tracks dating a rich girl inevitably raised the idea that the boy and girl might be of different races -- a subject that was very, very, controversial in the mid-sixties. [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "Uptight"] "Uptight" made number three on the pop charts and number one on the R&B charts, and saved Stevie Wonder's career. And this is where, for all that I've criticised Motown in this episode, their strategy paid off. Mickey Stevenson talked a lot about how in the early sixties Motown didn't give up on artists -- if someone had potential but was not yet having hits or finding the right approach, they would keep putting out singles in a holding pattern, trying different things and seeing what would work, rather than toss them aside. It had already worked for the Temptations and the Supremes, and now it had worked for Stevie Wonder. He would be the last beneficiary of this policy -- soon things would change, and Motown would become increasingly focused on trying to get the maximum returns out of a small number of stars, rather than building careers for a range of artists -- but it paid off brilliantly for Wonder. "Uptight" was such a reinvention of Wonder's career, sound, and image that many of his fans consider it the real start of his career -- everything before it only counting as prologue. The follow-up, "Nothing's Too Good For My Baby", was an "Uptight" soundalike, and as with Motown soundalike follow-ups in general, it didn't do quite as well, but it still made the top twenty on the pop chart and got to number four on the R&B chart. Stevie Wonder was now safe at Motown, and so he was going to do something no other Motown act had ever done before -- he was going to record a protest song and release it as a single. For about a year he'd been ending his shows with a version of Bob Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind", sung as a duet with Clarence Paul, who was still his on stage bandleader even though the two weren't working together in the studio as much. Wonder brought that into the studio, and recorded it with Paul back as the producer, and as his duet partner. Berry Gordy wasn't happy with the choice of single, but Wonder pushed, and Gordy knew that Wonder was on a winning streak and gave in, and so "Blowin' in the Wind" became Stevie Wonder's next single: [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder and Clarence Paul, "Blowin' in the Wind"] "Blowin' in the Wind" made the top ten, and number one on the R&B charts, and convinced Gordy that there was some commercial potential in going after the socially aware market, and over the next few years Motown would start putting out more and more political records. Because Motown convention was to have the producer of a hit record produce the next hit for that artist, and keep doing so until they had a flop, Paul was given the opportunity to produce the next single. "A Place in the Sun" was another ambiguously socially-aware song, co-written by the only white writer on Motown staff, Ron Miller, who happened to live in the same building as Stevie's tutor-cum-manager Ted Hull. "A Place in the Sun" was a pleasant enough song, inspired by "A Change is Gonna Come", but with a more watered-down, generic, message of hope, but the record was lifted by Stevie's voice, and again made the top ten. This meant that Paul and Miller, and Miller's writing partner Bryan Mills, got to work on his next two singles -- his 1966 Christmas song "Someday at Christmas", which made number twenty-four, and the ballad "Travellin' Man" which made thirty-two. The downward trajectory with Paul meant that Wonder was soon working with other producers again. Harvey Fuqua and Johnny Bristol cut another Miller and Mills song with him, "Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday": [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday"] But that was left in the can, as not good enough to release, and Stevie was soon back working with Cosby. The two of them had come up with an instrumental together in late 1966, but had not been able to come up with any words for it, so they played it for Smokey Robinson, who said their instrumental sounded like circus music, and wrote lyrics about a clown: [Excerpt: The Miracles, "The Tears of a Clown"] The Miracles cut that as album filler, but it was released three years later as a single and became the Miracles' only number one hit with Smokey Robinson as lead singer. So Wonder and Cosby definitely still had their commercial touch, even if their renewed collaboration with Moy, who they started working with again, took a while to find a hit. To start with, Wonder returned to the idea of taking inspiration from a hit by a white British group, as he had with "Uptight". This time it was the Beatles, and the track "Michelle", from the Rubber Soul album: [Excerpt: The Beatles, "Michelle"] Wonder took the idea of a song with some French lyrics, and a melody with some similarities to the Beatles song, and came up with "My Cherie Amour", which Cosby and Moy finished off. [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "My Cherie Amour"] Gordy wouldn't allow that to be released, saying it was too close to "Michelle" and people would think it was a rip-off, and it stayed in the vaults for several years. Cosby also produced a version of a song Ron Miller had written with Orlando Murden, "For Once in My Life", which pretty much every other Motown act was recording versions of -- the Four Tops, the Temptations, Billy Eckstine, Martha and the Vandellas and Barbra McNair all cut versions of it in 1967, and Gordy wouldn't let Wonder's version be put out either. So they had to return to the drawing board. But in truth, Stevie Wonder was not the biggest thing worrying Berry Gordy at this point. He was dealing with problems in the Supremes, which we'll look at in a future episode -- they were about to get rid of Florence Ballard, and thus possibly destroy one of the biggest acts in the world, but Gordy thought that if they *didn't* get rid of her they would be destroying themselves even more certainly. Not only that, but Gordy was in the midst of a secret affair with Diana Ross, Holland, Dozier, and Holland were getting restless about their contracts, and his producers kept bringing him unlistenable garbage that would never be a hit. Like Norman Whitfield, insisting that this track he'd cut with Marvin Gaye, "I Heard it Through the Grapevine", should be a single. Gordy had put his foot down about that one too, just like he had about "My Cherie Amour", and wouldn't allow it to be released. Meanwhile, many of the smaller acts on the label were starting to feel like they were being ignored by Gordy, and had formed what amounted to a union, having regular meetings at Clarence Paul's house to discuss how they could pressure the label to put the same effort into their careers as into those of the big stars. And the Funk Brothers, the musicians who played on all of Motown's hits, were also getting restless -- they contributed to the arrangements, and they did more for the sound of the records than half the credited producers; why weren't they getting production credits and royalties? Harvey Fuqua had divorced Gordy's sister Gwen, and so became persona non grata at the label and was in the process of leaving Motown, and so was Mickey Stevenson, Gordy's second in command, because Gordy wouldn't give him any stock in the company. And Detroit itself was on edge. The crime rate in the city had started to go up, but even worse, the *perception* of crime was going up. The Detroit News had been running a campaign to whip up fear, which it called its Secret Witness campaign, and running constant headlines about rapes, murders, and muggings. These in turn had led to increased calls for more funds for the police, calls which inevitably contained a strong racial element and at least implicitly linked the perceived rise in crime to the ongoing Civil Rights movement. At this point the police in Detroit were ninety-three percent white, even though Detroit's population was over thirty percent Black. The Mayor and Police Commissioner were trying to bring in some modest reforms, but they weren't going anywhere near fast enough for the Black population who felt harassed and attacked by the police, but were still going too fast for the white people who were being whipped up into a state of terror about supposedly soft-on-crime policies, and for the police who felt under siege and betrayed by the politicians. And this wasn't the only problem affecting the city, and especially affecting Black people. Redlining and underfunded housing projects meant that the large Black population was being crammed into smaller and smaller spaces with fewer local amenities. A few Black people who were lucky enough to become rich -- many of them associated with Motown -- were able to move into majority-white areas, but that was just leading to white flight, and to an increase in racial tensions. The police were on edge after the murder of George Overman Jr, the son of a policeman, and though they arrested the killers that was just another sign that they weren't being shown enough respect. They started organising "blu flu"s -- the police weren't allowed to strike, so they'd claim en masse that they were off sick, as a protest against the supposed soft-on-crime administration. Meanwhile John Sinclair was organising "love-ins", gatherings of hippies at which new bands like the MC5 played, which were being invaded by gangs of bikers who were there to beat up the hippies. And the Detroit auto industry was on its knees -- working conditions had got bad enough that the mostly Black workforce organised a series of wildcat strikes. All in all, Detroit was looking less and less like somewhere that Berry Gordy wanted to stay, and the small LA subsidiary of Motown was rapidly becoming, in his head if nowhere else, the more important part of the company, and its future. He was starting to think that maybe he should leave all these ungrateful people behind in their dangerous city, and move the parts of the operation that actually mattered out to Hollywood. Stevie Wonder was, of course, one of the parts that mattered, but the pressure was on in 1967 to come up with a hit as big as his records from 1965 and early 66, before he'd been sidetracked down the ballad route. The song that was eventually released was one on which Stevie's mother, Lula Mae Hardaway, had a co-writing credit: [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "I Was Made to Love Her"] "I Was Made to Love Her" was inspired by Wonder's first love, a girl from the same housing projects as him, and he talked about the song being special to him because it was true, saying it "kind of speaks of my first love to a girl named Angie, who was a very beautiful woman... Actually, she was my third girlfriend but my first love. I used to call Angie up and, like, we would talk and say, 'I love you, I love you,' and we'd talk and we'd both go to sleep on the phone. And this was like from Detroit to California, right? You know, mother said, 'Boy, what you doing - get off the phone!' Boy, I tell you, it was ridiculous." But while it was inspired by her, like with many of the songs from this period, much of the lyric came from Moy -- her mother grew up in Arkansas, and that's why the lyric started "I was born in Little Rock", as *her* inspiration came from stories told by her parents. But truth be told, the lyrics weren't particularly detailed or impressive, just a standard story of young love. Rather what mattered in the record was the music. The song was structured differently from many Motown records, including most of Wonder's earlier ones. Most Motown records had a huge amount of dynamic variation, and a clear demarcation between verse and chorus. Even a record like "Dancing in the Street", which took most of its power from the tension and release caused by spending most of the track on one chord, had the release that came with the line "All we need is music", and could be clearly subdivided into different sections. "I Was Made to Love Her" wasn't like that. There was a tiny section which functioned as a middle eight -- and which cover versions like the one by the Beach Boys later that year tend to cut out, because it disrupts the song's flow: [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "I Was Made to Love Her"] But other than that, the song has no verse or chorus, no distinct sections, it's just a series of lyrical couplets over the same four chords, repeating over and over, an incessant groove that could really go on indefinitely: [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "I Was Made to Love Her"] This is as close as Motown had come at this point to the new genre of funk, of records that were just staying with one groove throughout. It wasn't a funk record, not yet -- it was still a pop-soul record, But what made it extraordinary was the bass line, and this is why I had to emphasise earlier that this was a record by the Funk Brothers, not the Wrecking Crew, no matter how much some Crew members may claim otherwise. As on most of Cosby's sessions, James Jamerson was given free reign to come up with his own part with little guidance, and what he came up with is extraordinary. This was at a time when rock and pop basslines were becoming a little more mobile, thanks to the influence of Jamerson in Detroit, Brian Wilson in LA, and Paul McCartney in London. But for the most part, even those bass parts had been fairly straightforward technically -- often inventive, but usually just crotchets and quavers, still keeping rhythm along with the drums rather than in dialogue with them, roaming free rhythmically. Jamerson had started to change his approach, inspired by the change in studio equipment. Motown had upgraded to eight-track recording in 1965, and once he'd become aware of the possibilities, and of the greater prominence that his bass parts could have if they were recorded on their own track, Jamerson had become a much busier player. Jamerson was a jazz musician by inclination, and so would have been very aware of John Coltrane's legendary "sheets of sound", in which Coltrane would play fast arpeggios and scales, in clusters of five and seven notes, usually in semiquaver runs (though sometimes in even smaller fractions -- his solo in Miles Davis' "Straight, No Chaser" is mostly semiquavers but has a short passage in hemidemisemiquavers): [Excerpt: Miles Davis, "Straight, No Chaser"] Jamerson started to adapt the "sheets of sound" style to bass playing, treating the bass almost as a jazz solo instrument -- though unlike Coltrane he was also very, very concerned with creating something that people could tap their feet to. Much like James Brown, Jamerson was taking jazz techniques and repurposing them for dance music. The most notable example of that up to this point had been in the Four Tops' "Bernadette", where there are a few scuffling semiquaver runs thrown in, and which is a much more fluid part than most of his playing previously: [Excerpt: The Four Tops, "Bernadette"] But on "Bernadette", Jamerson had been limited by Holland, Dozier, and Holland, who liked him to improvise but around a framework they created. Cosby, on the other hand, because he had been a Funk Brother himself, was much more aware of the musicians' improvisational abilities, and would largely give them a free hand. This led to a truly remarkable bass part on "I Was Made to Love Her", which is somewhat buried in the single mix, but Marcus Miller did an isolated recreation of the part for the accompanying CD to a book on Jamerson, Standing in the Shadows of Motown, and listening to that you can hear just how inventive it is: [Excerpt: Marcus Miller, "I Was Made to Love Her"] This was exciting stuff -- though much less so for the touring musicians who went on the road with the Motown revues while Jamerson largely stayed in Detroit recording. Jamerson's family would later talk about him coming home grumbling because complaints from the touring musicians had been brought to him, and he'd been asked to play less difficult parts so they'd find it easier to replicate them on stage. "I Was Made to Love Her" wouldn't exist without Stevie Wonder, Hank Cosby, Sylvia Moy, or Lula Mae Hardaway, but it's James Jamerson's record through and through: [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "I Was Made to Love Her"] It went to number two on the charts, sat between "Light My Fire" at number one, and "All You Need is Love" at number three, with the Beatles song soon to overtake it and make number one itself. But within a few weeks of "I Was Made to Love Her" reaching its chart peak, things in Detroit would change irrevocably. On the 23rd of July, the police busted an illegal drinking den. They thought they were only going to get about twenty-five people there, but there turned out to be a big party on. They tried to arrest seventy-four people, but their wagon wouldn't fit them all in so they had to call reinforcements and make the arrestees wait around til more wagons arrived. A crowd of hundreds gathered while they were waiting. Someone threw a brick at a squad car window, a rumour went round that the police had bayonetted someone, and soon the city was in flames. Riots lasted for days, with people burning down and looting businesses, but what really made the situation bad was the police's overreaction. They basically started shooting at young Black men, using them as target practice, and later claiming they were snipers, arsonists, and looters -- but there were cases like the Algiers Motel incident, where the police raided a motel where several Black men, including the members of the soul group The Dramatics, were hiding out along with a few white women. The police sexually assaulted the women, and then killed three of the men for associating with white women, in what was described as a "lynching with bullets". The policemen in question were later acquitted of all charges. The National Guard were called in, as were Federal troops -- the 82nd Airborne Division, and the 101st Airborne from Clarksville, the division in which Jimi Hendrix had recently served. After four days of rioting, one of the bloodiest riots in US history was at an end, with forty-three people dead (of whom thirty-three were Black and only one was a policeman). Official counts had 1,189 people injured, and over 7,200 arrests, almost all of them of Black people. A lot of the histories written later say that Black-owned businesses were spared during the riots, but that wasn't really the case. For example, Joe's Record Shop, owned by Joe Von Battle, who had put out the first records by C.L. Franklin and his daughter Aretha, was burned down, destroying not only the stock of records for sale but the master tapes of hundreds of recordings of Black artists, many of them unreleased and so now lost forever. John Lee Hooker, one of the artists whose music Von Battle had released, soon put out a song, "The Motor City is Burning", about the events: [Excerpt: John Lee Hooker, "The Motor City is Burning"] But one business that did remain unburned was Motown, with the Hitsville studio going untouched by flames and unlooted. Motown legend has this being down to the rioters showing respect for the studio that had done so much for Detroit, but it seems likely to have just been luck. Although Motown wasn't completely unscathed -- a National Guard tank fired a shell through the building, leaving a gigantic hole, which Berry Gordy saw as soon as he got back from a business trip he'd been on during the rioting. That was what made Berry Gordy decide once and for all that things needed to change. Motown owned a whole row of houses near the studio, which they used as additional office space and for everything other than the core business of making records. Gordy immediately started to sell them, and move the admin work into temporary rented space. He hadn't announced it yet, and it would be a few years before the move was complete, but from that moment on, the die was cast. Motown was going to leave Detroit and move to Hollywood.
Hey Cringers! It's “Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine!” This movie in 10 words or less: “Vincent Price disrupts financial markets using bikini clad robots”. Our review of this movie is here: Movie Reviews, along with our reviews of dozens of other uncomfortable movies. As always, we'd love to hear from you! Email us at sscringefest@gmail.com. We'll likely read your letter on the podcast, so be nice. Or don't. That's OK, we'll still read it. Follow us on all of the the social stuff: Instagram Facebook Twitter YouTube Our other nonsense can be found at www.sscringefest.com And like, share, and review us on your favorite podcast platform. We love you all. Even you Aaron.
Agents Scott and Cam, along with guest operative Beth Accomando of the Cinema Junkie blog and podcast, evade swimsuit-clad robots in San Francisco while tackling the 1965 Vincent Price spy spoof Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine. Directed by Norman Taurog. Starring Vincent Price, Frankie Avalon, Dwayne Hickman, Susan Hart, Jack Mullaney and Fred Clark. The Cinema Junkie podcast is available everywhere! Make sure to check out Beth's Geeky Gourmet videos and more on the show's blog. Become a SpyHards Patron and gain access to top secret "Agents in the Field" bonus episodes, movie commentaries and more! Pick up exclusive SpyHards merch, including the "What Does Vargas Do?" t-shirt by @shaylayy, available only at Redbubble Social media: @spyhards View the NOC List and the Disavowed List at Letterboxd.com/spyhards Podcast artwork by Hannah Hughes.
Compañeros Radio Network proudly presents episode 45 of Movies About Girls. This episode was originally released on December 14, 2009. "Gidget! Dr Goldfoot! G-Rated Sleaze!" Please support the Compañeros Radio Network Patreon, if you can! Check out the other Compañeros Radio Network shows: Movie Melt Songs on Trial Get Soft with Dr Snuggles Heavy Leather Horror Show Ballbusters In Search of the Perfect Podcast
Dr. Goldfoot & The Bikini Machine | C.H.O.M.P.S. - Hey everyone! Welcome to another episode of Motion Picture Meltdown! This week Phil picks a couple of blind robot flick picks, and we roast through Dr. Goldfoot & The Bikini Machine and C.H.O.M.P.S. In this episode, you'll hear us create our own homemade household murder machines, the fact these movies could have been slightly darker, and of
Eh mais dites donc ! Ca serait pas le 21 juin (si vous écoutez/lisez cette description le jour de la première diffusion, évidemment) des fois ? Ce qui signifie : c'est l'été ! Et c'est la Fête de la musique ! C'est pourquoi nous consacrons notre émission du mois aux liens entre musique et nourriture. Dans cet épisode, nous parlons de variétoche, de chanson à boire, de fromages affinés de façon un peu spéciale, de glace au sarrasin, d'instruments à cordes, à vent et à percussion, de Pierre Gagnaire, de la Haute-Marne, de l'entre-soi toujours très masculin des cuisines professionnelles, de Damien Saez, de Téléphone et de Tryo. L'épisode est en outre émaillé de quelques extraits musicaux pour le plus grand bonheur de vos oreilles. Et en bonus, Bertrand fait un point non exhaustif sur l'équipement de cuisine de Thomas. Extraits musicaux diffusés : Bikini Machine, Le Jerk Du Gastronome SCH, Kofs, Jul, Naps, Soso Maness, Elams, Houari et Solda, Bande Organisée The Baseballs, Umbrella Astonvilla feat. Jean-Louis Aubert, Alain Bashung, Zazie, Jacques Lanzman, Reuno, Maurice, Jean-Pierre Coffe, Elise et Doc, Slowfood LMFAO feat. Lil Jon, Shots Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Requiem - III Sequentia - Dies Irae Billy Ze Kick Et Les Gamins En Folie, Mangez-moi ! Mangez-moi ! Si le thème de la musique et plus spécifiquement du son dans la bouffe vous intéresse, nous vous encourageons à écouter ce numéro du Goût du Monde de RFI , diffusé à l'occasion des 100 ans de la radio. La Grosse Bouffe est un podcast dédié au manger et au boire. Les nouveaux épisodes sortent tous les 21 du mois. Retrouvez La Grosse Bouffe sur Ausha, Apple Podcast et toutes les autres plateformes de téléchargement de podcasts. Vous pouvez également nous suivre et glisser en DM sur Twitter à @la_grossebouffe, et nous écrire à lagrossebouffepodcast@gmail.com
Sorry everyone, we missed our Sunday night upload. We had to stop the podcast in the middle to address a family emergency. If the second segment of the show sounds different from the first it is because it had to be recorded remotely. Due to limited options as far as new films this week we chose to do a "Double Random Spectacular". Listen to see just how that turn out (back fired) on us. We review the 1973 romantic classic The Way We Were (1973) as well as Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine from 1965.
In the first of a 2-part episode, comedian, actor and Emmy-winning writer Dana Gould returns to the show for a funny, frenetic conversation about the "science" of monster movies, the extravagance of Sammy Davis Jr., the generosity of Roddy McDowall (and Charlton Heston!) and the new web series, "Hanging with Dr. Z." Also, Dwight Frye checks out, Darren McGavin dons a bathrobe, Orson Welles turns down "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" and Andy Griffith "punches up" "The Ghost and Mr. Chicken." PLUS: Burt Mustin! "King Kong Escapes"! "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine"! Don Knotts meets Mr. Potter! And Dana teams with the one and only Mel Brooks! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The Fellowship is pleased to present a combined installment of our comedy month for 2021. This year we're focusing on spy parody movies, and this week we're covering Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965) and Modesty Blaise (1966). Both of these films share an obvious influence (see if you can spot it
Good Morning it's Saturday January 9th, and this is The Wenatchee World's newest podcast, Slices of Wenatchee. We're excited to bring you a closer look at one of our top stories and other announcements every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. Today - The Chelan County Commissioner England signs off after 12 years This episode is brought to you by Equilus Group Incorporated. Equilus Group, Inc is a Registered Investment Advisory Firm in the states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. Equilus Group, Inc- Building Your Financial Success. Learn more at Equilusfinancial.com. Member SIPC and FINRA. Now our feature story. After 12 years, Chelan County Commissioner Doug England will get to enjoy retirement. England signed off as a commissioner after a recent meeting, handing off the position of chair to Commissioner Bob Bugert. Bugert and Commissioner Kevin Overbay thanked England for his years of service. Bugert said that he has tremendous respect for England and how he's been a leader of the Chelan County Commission over the last 12 years. And Overbay thanked him for showing him the ropes the last four years as a commissioner. He noted that England was gracious even in his disagreements. England thanked the commissioners for their work and said all five commissioners he worked with showed honor and integrity. He said he didn't think there should be a limit on how many times a commissioner could run for office, but that politicians should leave when it is time. England said that [quote] “they change politicians and diapers for the same reason and I think three terms is enough and I think it is time for someone else to step in and take care of it” With England's retirement there are no more orchardists or agricultural industry employees on the Chelan County Commission. Overbay worked for the Washington State Patrol, Bugert for the Chelan-Douglas Land Trust and on the Salmon Recovery Funding Board and incoming Commissioner Tiffany Gering for the Lake Chelan Chamber of Commerce. Overbay is now the longest serving commissioner that oversees Chelan County government, land planning and budgets. State Representative Keith Goehner served with England for about 10 years. Goehner said he enjoyed working with England who he said brought a lot of experience from his years as an orchardist and from just looking at the bigger picture. Goehner said he was impressed by England's work to get the Stehekin Road fixed that washed out several years ago. At the time, England went to Washington, D.C. frequently and talked to many people in an effort to resolve that problem. And though the road is still damaged, the environmental review process is underway for fixing it. Chelan County's reserve has also grown to about $13 million during England's time. He also pushed for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to abandon efforts to transplant grizzly bears in the North Cascades. Some of his other accomplishments include starting the short-term rental regulation process, passing zoning regulations on cannabis producers, developing a Shoreline Master Plan Program, guiding improvements for the Chelan County Regional Justice Center, and overseeing changes in local mental health treatment. Now, our weekly profile of one of the World's 30 Under 35 award recipients. 29 year old Xochitl Velazquez is the Assistant director at the Washington Apple Education Foundation. After graduating from Eastmont High School and Wenatchee Valley College in 2009, Velazquez went on to attend Gonzaga University. She earned a bachelor's degree in business in 2012, and the following year earned a master of business administration degree. About four years ago she accepted a job as a lender at Cashmere Valley Bank, a move that allowed her to return to the Wenatchee Valley to be closer to family. Once here, she got involved in the community, joining the board of the NCW Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and stepping up her volunteer efforts with the Washington Apple Education Foundation. And then in September 2019, she accepted the post of assistant director at the WAEF. Her focus is now on coordinating events for current college scholarship recipients and working with volunteers. This spring, she adapted WAEF events to move from in-person to virtual settings to help make sure students did not get behind on their education dreams and career goals despite the challenges of the pandemic. For Velasquez, being a successful and accomplished individual is her way of giving back to her family for their continuous love and support. Finally, some local history, Wenatchee Valley History is brought to you by NABUR – your trusted neighborhood community. NABUR is a free online forum you can trust to connect with your community, focus on facts & make a difference. Join the conversation! Visit wenatcheeworld.com/nabur Susan Hart was born in Wenatchee, and became a well known actress in the 1960's. She starred in movies like Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, City in the Sea, and The Wild Wild West. Thanks for listening. Today's episode is brought to you by Equilus Group, Inc- Building Your Financial Success. Learn more at Equilusfinancial.com The Wenatchee World has been engaging, informing and inspiring North Central Washington Communities since 1905. We encourage you to subscribe today to keep your heart and mind connected to what matters most in North Central Washington. Thank you for starting your morning with us and don't forget to tune in again on Tuesday! Support the show: https://www.wenatcheeworld.com/site/forms/subscription_services/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week Ben and Hank watched Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965) and Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs (1966), both starring Vincent Price. They also answered an email about pets. Email: SaltCirclePodcast@gmail.com Twitter: @SaltCirclePod Hank's Twitter: @ComicPanels The Burning Barrel Discord: discord.gg/jBDGW5j Logo Artist: bellamy.world/
This month Lee is back with the second half of his look at the scores and soundtracks of the AIP Beach Party films, this time covering the spin-offs and unofficial sequels in the series. Selections from Les Baxter's Score for "Beach Blanket Bingo" (1965): --Bonehead's New Love--Fly Boy--Beach Blanket Bingo "Ski Party" (1965): --The Gasser & Ski Party --The Hondells--We'll Never Change Them --Deborah Walley--Paintin' the Town --Frankie Avalon and Deborah Walley--I Feel Good --James Brown and The Famous Flames "Sergeant Deadhead" (1965): --How Can You Tell --Deborah Walley--Two-Timing Angel --Donna Loren--You Should've Seen the One That Got Away --Eve Arden "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine" (1965): --Dr. Goldfoot And The Bikini Machine --The Supremes "Fireball 500" (1966): --My Way That Gets Me My Way --Frankie Avalon--Step Right Up --Annette Funicello "Thunder Alley" (1967): --Theme from Thunder Alley --Band Without A Name --Riot in Thunder Alley --Eddie Beram--What's a Girl to Do --Annette Funicello--Calahan's Theme --Loraine Singers--Theme from Thunder Alley (Instrumental) --The Sidewalk Sounds Opening and closing music: End Title from "Horror Express" by John Cacavas & In Un Altro Bar from "Revolver" by Ennio Morricone.
This podcast was created to share our love of the holidays, year-round, with you. The HolidayMoons Podcast Foils Dr. Goldfoot's Evil Plans!!! In this week’s episode, we continue our Summer series topic on Beach Party Movies and Cole shares a "Christmas" movie review. Next up in our Beach Party movies is Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, where we continue our ridiculous trek further away from an actual beach movie! Cole's movie review on Santa's Slay, a 2005 Canadian-American Christmas slasher comedy film that stars professional wrestler Bill Goldberg as Santa Claus . Find out on this week's episode of the HolidayMoons podcast! Join us, won't you, for this fun and informative, ad-free, and free-in-general, HolidayMoons podcast! www.stitcher.com/podcast/holidaymoons #holidaymoons #holidaymoonspodcast #beachpartymovies #drgoldfoot #drgoldfootandthebikinimachine #santasslay #santa And you can follow us on the below social media sites: Twitter: @holiday_moons Instagram: @holidaymoons Facebook Page and Group: holidaymoons Website: randalmoon.wixsite.com/holidaymoons HolidayMoons was created because we love and celebrate holidays and seasons throughout the year, and we want to share our love with you. It includes decorating, going to festivals and events, watching related TV shows and movies, listening to seasonal music, cooking and eating, seasonal shopping, and best of all, enjoying how others, like you, have celebrated the holidays.
This podcast was created to share our love of the holidays, year-round, with you. The HolidayMoons Podcast Foils Dr. Goldfoot's Evil Plans!!! In this week's episode, we continue our Summer series topic on Beach Party Movies and Cole shares a "Christmas" movie review. Next up in our Beach Party movies is Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, where we continue our ridiculous trek further away from an actual beach movie! Cole's movie review on Santa's Slay, a 2005 Canadian-American Christmas slasher comedy film that stars professional wrestler Bill Goldberg as Santa Claus . Find out on this week's episode of the HolidayMoons podcast! Join us, won't you, for this fun and informative, ad-free, and free-in-general, HolidayMoons podcast! www.stitcher.com/podcast/holidaymoons #holidaymoons #holidaymoonspodcast #beachpartymovies #drgoldfoot #drgoldfootandthebikinimachine #santasslay #santa And you can follow us on the below social media sites: Twitter: @holiday_moons Instagram: @holidaymoons Facebook Page and Group: holidaymoons Website: randalmoon.wixsite.com/holidaymoons HolidayMoons was created because we love and celebrate holidays and seasons throughout the year, and we want to share our love with you. It includes decorating, going to festivals and events, watching related TV shows and movies, listening to seasonal music, cooking and eating, seasonal shopping, and best of all, enjoying how others, like you, have celebrated the holidays.
Bienvenidos a la octava edición de El Tricorder, el magazine de Los Retronautas que vuela más allá de la Batalla de Yavin. En este programa hablamos de una serie de obras centradas en la figura de los ginoides, los robots de apariencia femenina. Los libros: - "La Eva Futura" de Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam. - "La Chica Mecánica" de Paolo Bacigalupi El cómic: - "Sky Doll" de Alessandro Barbucci y Barbara Canepa La serie: - "Mann & Machine" (1992) Las películas: - Doctor Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965) - Eva (2011) - The Machine (2013) - Ex Machina (2015) - AI Rising (2018) Además, Nuria Franco nos hablará del clásico "Las Esposas de Stepford" de Ira Levin (y las películas), Esther Oliva de Arale Norimaki del anime "Dr. Slump", Antonio Monfort de los ginoides en el universo Star Trek y Albert PR17 de la película española "Supernova". Nos acompaña la música de Aviador Dro con "La chica de plexiglás" y cerramos con "Machines" de Queen. La sintonía es el "Rock Lobster" de los B-52's y la música de fondo esta: https://youtu.be/6TEGPexTqr4 Síguenos y contacta con nosotros a través de Facebook en https://www.facebook.com/retronautas, en Twitter en @losretronautas o escríbenos a nuestro correo electrónico: losretronautas@yahoo.com Y si quieres ayudar a que la Retardis siga volando puedes unirte a la infantería móvil retronaútica en Ivoox o https://www.patreon.com/losretronautas ¡Larga vida y prosperidad!
Bienvenidos a la octava edición de El Tricorder, el magazine de Los Retronautas que vuela más allá de la Batalla de Yavin. En este programa hablamos de una serie de obras centradas en la figura de los ginoides, los robots de apariencia femenina. Los libros: - "La Eva Futura" de Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam. - "La Chica Mecánica" de Paolo Bacigalupi El cómic: - "Sky Doll" de Alessandro Barbucci y Barbara Canepa La serie: - "Mann & Machine" (1992) Las películas: - Doctor Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965) - Eva (2011) - The Machine (2013) - Ex Machina (2015) - AI Rising (2018) Además, Nuria Franco nos hablará del clásico "Las Esposas de Stepford" de Ira Levin (y las películas), Esther Oliva de Arale Norimaki del anime "Dr. Slump", Antonio Monfort de los ginoides en el universo Star Trek y Albert PR17 de la película española "Supernova". Nos acompaña la música de Aviador Dro con "La chica de plexiglás" y cerramos con "Machines" de Queen. La sintonía es el "Rock Lobster" de los B-52's y la música de fondo esta: https://youtu.be/6TEGPexTqr4 Síguenos y contacta con nosotros a través de Facebook en https://www.facebook.com/retronautas, en Twitter en @losretronautas o escríbenos a nuestro correo electrónico: losretronautas@yahoo.com Y si quieres ayudar a que la Retardis siga volando puedes unirte a la infantería móvil retronaútica en Ivoox o https://www.patreon.com/losretronautas ¡Larga vida y prosperidad!
Diese Folge wurde Mitte Januar vor dem Ausbruch der Corona-Krise aufgezeichnet und sollte eigentlich im Papierkorb landen, doch nun haben wir sie doch herausgekramt, um euch zu unterhalten! Matthias, Marco und Sebastian hauen sich wieder drei Filme um die Ohren. Erst wird es sexy heiß, dann eiskalt und danach greifen Ninjas aus dem Nichts an! Unsere Filme: Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965), ein Beach-Party-Comedy-Vehikel in dem ein bösartiger Erfinder (Vincent Price) Bikini-Mädchen-Roboter auf Politiker und Millionäre ansetzt, um sich zu bereichern und (vermutlich) die Herrschaft der Welt an sich zu reißen. Zwei stumpfsinnige Männer nehmen den klamaukigen Kampf auf. (gesichtet auf DVD | Regie: Norman Taurog) The Iceman Cometh (1989), ein Fantasy-Kung-Fu-Actioner, in dem eine kaiserliche Wache (Yuen Biao) aus der Ming-Dynastie durch die Zeit reist, um einen Gegenspieler (Yuen Wah) zu stellen. Im Hong Kong des Jahres 1989 kommt es dann zum hartgesottenen Showdown. Mit Maggie Cheung! Ach ja, mit Maggie Cheung! (gesichtet auf BluRay | Regie: Clarence Yiu-leung Fok) Ninja in the Dragon's Den (1982), ein Flawless-Victory-Kung-Fu-Klassiker in dem ein Ninja (Hiroyuki Sanada) von Japan nach China reist, um Rache für den Tod seines Onkels zu nehmen. Dort trifft er auf den Ziehsohn (Conan Lee) seines Feindes und es kommt zum Kräftemessen zwischen den Kulturen und saftigen Wendungen, die nur vom göttlichen Soundtrack in ihrer Intensität überboten werden. Darf Film so gut sein? Ja! (gesichtet auf BluRay | Regie: Corey Yuen) Mitmachen: Habt ihr Filmtipps, Kommentare oder Kritiken? Dann schick uns doch einen Audioclip, den wir in der nächsten Folge spielen können. Das geht ganz einfach auf http://www.anchor.fm/filmkammer Emails könnt ihr uns an filmkammer@megaliferadio.net senden Die Filmkammer des Schreckens sind: Matthias Kempke | Twitter | Facebook Marco Felici | Facebook | Instagram Sebastian Kempke | Website | Twitter | Facebook Marco bei Letterboxd Sebastian bei Letterboxd Hört die Filmkammer auf Apple Podcasts, auf Spotify und anchor.fm Megalife Radio findet ihr auf Facebook und Twitter und natürlich auf unserer offiziellen Website Music from https://filmmusic.io "Inner Sanctum" by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com) License: CC BY (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/filmkammer/message
Gilbert and Frank welcome actor, musician and Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Steven Van Zandt for a fun, freewheeling conversation about beloved kiddie show hosts, the glory days of Top 40 radio, the mystique of gangster movies, the Beatles' impact on popular culture and the Rat Pack's "connection" to the E Street Band. Also, Darlene Love mounts a comeback, Little Richard officiates a wedding, Ol' Blue Eyes covers Simon & Garfunkel and Steven remembers his friend James Gandolfini. PLUS: The Singing Nun! "Angels with Dirty Faces"! The genius of William Castle! "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine"! And Gilbert and Steven pay tribute to "The Nutty Professor"! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Will Congleton (you might remember him from waaay back on episode 7) returns to talk with us about another obscure gem - 1965’s Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine. We gush over the late, great Vincent Price, sing the instantly catchy theme song, wonder how many flights are in a flock, explain who the heck that biker guy in the dungeon is and discuss sexy bank robbery and Where the Red Fern Grows, as well as defining the phrase “champagne accident” and the origins of the “chin chin” toast. WARNING: This episode might not be suitable for Craigs or Todds.
The only logical conclusion to our thrilling month of Science Fiction based podcasting is precisely what will be delivered to you this week, in the form of this: a Robot Theme Show. Let's get metallic! Up first! Way back in the pre-9/11 days of yore, there was a movie called Forbidden Planet from 1956. It had a Brown-haired Leslie Nielsen, and strange sexual politics, and you were there, and you were there, and you were there... Next up! It's 1965's Dr. Goldfoot and Bikini Machine, a movie with a title so implausible only AIP could've produced it. And would you believe that your charming hosts argue about whether or not it's a sci-fi film? Feat Vinnie Price, Frank Avalon, babes. Finally! It's a third movie: Brain 17, which probably you ain't heard of, but maybe you've heard of it's bigger brother Daitetsujin 17. This 1982 feature is a recut of an earlier 1977 Toei-produced TV series, and features a whole horde of cheaply made Japanese giant robots tripping over themselves/cities. Who are the real monsters? It might be the dub voice actors. All this plus Parker's journalistic prowess reaps rewards, Sean stereotypes the local Japanese population, Parker's computer makes Windows sounds on the recording now and there's nothing on earth that can stop it, a really wild amount of dishwashing ambience, yet another one of those nights where Sean contemplates how he's wasted his life, more good recommendations from The Fallen One, seriously there's a whole ambient noise backstory going on in this episode and the entire plotline of it is centered around pot-scrubbing, an animated series based on your favorite Mogwai-based horror franchise, Feldmanspotting, should Gene Simmons fornicate a replicant in an arena?, Parker makes a home video selection blunder that leads to a classic disrespect situation, Kevin calls a movie a Drive-In Classic, for sure something is getting broken in the background noise there - like a window maybe - who knows?, Sean gets two movies mixed up in his mind, more mouse clicking noises than normal from reasons that remain largely mysterious, the insane outer-space sexual politics (of outer space!), restrictive pornography laws aboard space-cruises for space-men, Parker declares a movie should be 10 to 15 minutes shorter, shoe-horned garage-rock black-face bands, Parker Bowman falls in love with Frankie Avalon, teen wolf has nards, "suddenly: one year later", fake spy beards, our weekly news plus Blu-ray Picks and a whole lot more! Direct Donloyd HereGot a movie suggestion for the show, or better yet an opinion on next week's movies? Drop us a line at JFDPodcast@gmail.com. Or leave us a voicemail: 347-746-JUNK (5865). Add it to your telephone now! JOIN THE CONVERSATION!Also, if you like the show, please take a minute and subscribe and/or comment on us on iTunes, Stitcher, Blubrry or Podfeed.net. Check us out on Facebook and Twitter! We'd love to see some of your love on Patreon - it's super easy and fun to sign up for the extra bonus content. We'll see the first 16 Brains for your love and support. Please avoid checking out this embarrassing merchandise!
Dr. Goldfoot & The Bikini Machine | C.H.O.M.P.S. – Hey everyone! Welcome to another episode of Motion Picture Meltdown! This week Phil picks a couple of blind robot flick picks, and we roast through Dr. Goldfoot & The Bikini Machine and C.H.O.M.P.S. In this episode, you’ll hear us create our own homemade household murder machines, the fact these … Continue reading "MPM: Ep. 323 – Brobots Before Hobots"
Crack open a cold one with the boys as they sit through some bizarre 60s movie. Chris talks about Tales from the Crypt and Parker gets to experience Twin Peaks. Might as well call this Twin Peaksagate. The absolutely gorgeous cover art was designed and created by the ingenious Krystal Miner. For more exclusive content, be sure to check out www.terribleblog.net
Vincent Price has an evil plan to take over the world with fembots.
This episode looks beyond the canon of official and semi-official James Bond movies to see the immensely broad cultural impact 007 has had around the world. You can tell by how many awful knock-off movies have been made of it. Such movies feature in the list of topics discussed here: HBO's Confederate For Your Height Only, of the Phillipines The plague In Like Flint James Bond 777, of Tollywood James Bond Junior Sherlock Holmes and the 22nd Century Licensed to Kill, with a 'd' Breaking Bad fan films Lord of the Rings fan films The Rock Looney Tunes: Back in Action Dr Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, Dr Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs Two Mafioisi against Goldginger, of Italy Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die, of Brazil Help! It is Vengos, Visible Agent 000, of Greece The End of Agent W4C, of Soviet Czechoslovakia O.K. Connery, of Italy, starring Sean Connery's brother Neil Connery Fathom, starring Raquel Welch Unlocked and our upcoming Noomi Rapace podcast "I Hardly Noomi" From Hong Kong with Love, of France The Dragon Lives Again, in which Bruce Lee's ghost fights James Bond, Dracula and other characters From Beijing with Love, of China Pub Royale, starring Alan Carr How does America vote for Trump so relatively soon after the success of eco-warrior blockbuster Avatar? OSS 117 Never Say Never Mind: The Swedish Bikini Team 008: Operation Exterminate, of Italy The Agent 077 series of Italian exploitation cinema; -From the Orient with Fury -Mission Bloody Mary, -Special Mission Lady Chaplain The Simpsons and "You Only Move Twice" "Beloved Eva"
Science gets weird this week on Dread Media. First off, an expedition for a group of scientists heading to the Arctic Circle goes horribly wrong (does it ever go right?) in Harbinger Down. Rich the Monster Movie Kid continues his tribute to horror legends with birthdays in May with a look at two Vincent Price films: Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine and Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs. Devil Dinosaur Jr. delivers a brand new Stay Scary on the early talkie, Doctor X. Then Desmond and Duane look at a totally underrated classic 80s film: Dead and Buried. There are tunes, of course: "Winds from the North" by Frozen Dawn, "Cosmonaut" by At the Drive-In, "Goldfinger" by Leningrad Cowboys, "Doctor #8" by Tobin Sprout, "Bodies" by Danzig, and "Weird Science" by Oingo Boingo. Send feedback to: feedback@dreadmedia.net, or 206.278.5257. Follow @DevilDinosaurJr and @dreadmedia on Twitter! Join the Facebook group! Visit www.stayscary.wordpress.com and www.dreadmedia.bandcamp.com.
Science gets weird this week on Dread Media. First off, an expedition for a group of scientists heading to the Arctic Circle goes horribly wrong (does it ever go right?) in Harbinger Down. Rich the Monster Movie Kid continues his tribute to horror legends with birthdays in May with a look at two Vincent Price films: Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine and Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs. Devil Dinosaur Jr. delivers a brand new Stay Scary on the early talkie, Doctor X. Then Desmond and Duane look at a totally underrated classic 80s film: Dead and Buried. There are tunes, of course: "Winds from the North" by Frozen Dawn, "Cosmonaut" by At the Drive-In, "Goldfinger" by Leningrad Cowboys, "Doctor #8" by Tobin Sprout, "Bodies" by Danzig, and "Weird Science" by Oingo Boingo. Send feedback to: feedback@dreadmedia.net, or 206.278.5257. Follow @DevilDinosaurJr and @dreadmedia on Twitter! Join the Facebook group! Visit www.stayscary.wordpress.com and www.dreadmedia.bandcamp.com.
Science gets weird this week on Dread Media. First off, an expedition for a group of scientists heading to the Arctic Circle goes horribly wrong (does it ever go right?) in Harbinger Down. Rich the Monster Movie Kid continues his tribute to horror legends with birthdays in May with a look at two Vincent Price films: Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine and Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs. Devil Dinosaur Jr. delivers a brand new Stay Scary on the early talkie, Doctor X. Then Desmond and Duane look at a totally underrated classic 80s film: Dead and Buried. There are tunes, of course: "Winds from the North" by Frozen Dawn, "Cosmonaut" by At the Drive-In, "Goldfinger" by Leningrad Cowboys, "Doctor #8" by Tobin Sprout, "Bodies" by Danzig, and "Weird Science" by Oingo Boingo. Send feedback to: feedback@dreadmedia.net, or 206.278.5257. Follow @DevilDinosaurJr and @dreadmedia on Twitter! Join the Facebook group! Visit www.stayscary.wordpress.com and www.dreadmedia.bandcamp.com.
Science gets weird this week on Dread Media. First off, an expedition for a group of scientists heading to the Arctic Circle goes horribly wrong (does it ever go right?) in Harbinger Down. Rich the Monster Movie Kid continues his tribute to horror legends with birthdays in May with a look at two Vincent Price films: Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine and Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs. Devil Dinosaur Jr. delivers a brand new Stay Scary on the early talkie, Doctor X. Then Desmond and Duane look at a totally underrated classic 80s film: Dead and Buried. There are tunes, of course: "Winds from the North" by Frozen Dawn, "Cosmonaut" by At the Drive-In, "Goldfinger" by Leningrad Cowboys, "Doctor #8" by Tobin Sprout, "Bodies" by Danzig, and "Weird Science" by Oingo Boingo. Send feedback to: feedback@dreadmedia.net, or 206.278.5257. Follow @DevilDinosaurJr and @dreadmedia on Twitter! Join the Facebook group! Visit www.stayscary.wordpress.com and www.dreadmedia.bandcamp.com.
Yep, time for a new episode. Not a great movie this time but we enjoyed doing this episode The music is: Stronger than dirt by Tom King and the Starlighters Next up? Gamera vs Snake Plissken Just checking to see if anyone actually reads this stuff... Actually its Gamera vs Jiger
This episode features Vincent Price, Frankie Avalon’s helmet hair and a very bad song from The Supremes. Thanks to guest reviewer Sally Ann for taking time out of her busy season to join us! Interested in watching the film? Peep it on Amazon. Watch on iTunes. On with the show! Frowner Sausages may remember Sally from a couple of Montreal Sauce shows, S2E013 and S2E014. (It’s not an insult, Montreal Sauce fans on Twitter chose the name Sausages, for themselves!) Sally shares movie memories from different genres, Platoon & Annie. Chris gets Casualties of War mixed up with Platoon. We all regret Oliver Stone, but love Willem Dafoe & Forest Whitaker. What are these beach party films? The awful theme song by The Supremes and the opening claymation credits by Gumby’s Art Clokey. That song is thankfully absent from an album in Chris’ collection, Spy Magazine Presents, Vol. 1: Spy Music. First cameo in the film is Killer Croc! Frankie Avalon plays Jack Tripper with his costar in backwards clothes like Kriss Kross. Before Gilligan and before Dr. Goldfoot, there was The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis. Chris drops some film terminology on ya, Mise en scène. If you’re not interested in the sequel Dr. Goldfoot & the Girl Bombs, perhaps you would like the TV show, The Wild Weird World of Dr. Goldfoot. WHAT? Some of the torture scenes were borrowed from other Vincent Price films, like Pit and the Pendulum. Sally & Chris agree that Michael Cera and Jessie Eisenberg are interchangeable. During the car chase, geography becomes surreal? Fans in Grand Rapids, MI probably feel the same way about the car chase in 30 Minutes or Less. Chris compares the film to Gilligan’s Island & Beverly Hillbillies while Paul nails it, describing it as a very long episode of Get Smart. Sally recommends Palo Alto as “the complete opposite of this film” we watched. Paul is excited because The Wizard of Oz has been remastered and looks gorgeous. Chris says you should check out the star-studded comedy, Noises Off. Thanks to Sally for hanging out with us. Check out ShopSallyAnn.com for rad hand crafted designs and sallyannk.com for tutorials and more information. Support Film Frown on Patreon
Former teen idol Frankie Avalon broke into show business as a child prodigy and was soon receiving 12,000 pieces of fan mail per week and working alongside Hollywood greats Jack Benny, Jackie Gleason, Lucille Ball, Groucho Marx and John Wayne. Frankie joined Gilbert and Frank for a look back at his humble beginnings in South Philly, his years as a teen heartthrob and his decades-long friendship with onscreen love interest Annette Funicello. Plus: The Duke makes Laurence Harvey cry! Buster Keaton meets Houdini! "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine"! Dueling Draculas! And Cesar Romero and Arnold Stang hit a strip joint! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to greatest adventure ever attempted by handsome, bearded men with audio equipment! Paul & Chris will torture, err invite guests to review B-movies, bad films and cult classics. This is an intro to get to know the guys, (if you’ve never heard them jabbering on Montreal Sauce) and the films that they will be sacrificing in the near future. Hey, what podcasts are we listening to? Paul digs on some TWiT and Chris just found Gilbert Gottfried’s Amazing Colossal Podcast. How do you listen to podcasts? Chris uses Podcast Addict on Android and Paul is using Overcast. The first movie we’ll be giving the business to is A Boy and His Dog. Is this the scifi Lassie or Old Yeller? Movie two: Zardoz. Yikes, where do we start? Watch where you put that fun finger. Dr. Goldfoot & the Bikini Machine starring Vincent Price. “It seemed like a good idea?” That’s the tag line for The Thing With Two Heads and no doubt what we’ll be saying about this movie choice. Is Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter worthy of watching? More than one person has suggested Gymkata. Chris saw the trailer for Big Ass Spider and is very curious. Chris thinks we might have to do an episode where we watch the film together and record. Perhaps we could use Rabb.it? Send suggestions for films to the FilmFrown twitter account. And of course, follow that account to stay informed about live shows. Support Film Frown on Patreon
Vincent Price! We discuss the films and life of the famous terrifying actor and raconteur. We cover such films as House on Haunted Hill, The Fly, The Abominable Dr. Phibes, House of Wax, Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, and many many more! Also, election reflections, Star Wars bought by Disney, an interview with the Fifth Beatle (Bryan White of Cinema Suicide), and more!