Here’s a nice little sampler reel of clips from some of the best Vitaphone Varieties shorts of the late 20s and very early 30s. For those of you not familiar with the world of Vitaphone, the shorts were ‘captures’ of vaudeville acts of the day–the advent of sound made it

Nobody–and I mean nobody–rocks the Hammond B-3 quite the way the great Jimmy Smith does (did). As I descend into the weeds of my new musical obsession (the Hammond B-3) I find the greatest jazz organists–for me Jimmy, Shirley Scott and Joey DeFrancesco–have a way of dominating the instrument and

In my usual peregrinations through the aviation world on YouTube I came across the above very modest video which I find unusually moving. It’s a GoPro camera recording an older man’s first solo flight in a pre-1970s Piper Cherokee. The solo flight is just what it sounds like–the first time

Whenever I find myself in a state of general torpor, phlegmaticism or simple crappiness there are several go-to videos that I –er–go to. One of them is today’s clip–Bobby Van’s hopping “Take Me To Broadway” dance from “Small Town Girl” (1954). Conceived and directed by Busby Berekely. this extrordianry feat

For the past few days we’ve been watching movie stars in their pre-star years when they were blessed (yes, blessed!) to get a ‘national’ commercial. A national is no small get. The residuals are fat. The actors face gets exposure. The actor may not be known by name but the

Yesterday I posted a 1973 Dubonnet commercial featuring the then unknown Farrah Fawcett and Tom Selleck. Today it’s John Travolta’s turn. Here he is—llooking like he’s fourteen years told–in a very poignant commercial for life insurance. The end of it puzzles me–it turns out the bad news (spoiler alert) about

Behold a 1973 commercial for Dubonnet featuring two soon-to-be-megastars, Farrah Fawcett and Tom Selleck. What are the odds of finding two seismic TV icons just a few years prior to their fame and casting them in the same commercial? Answer: there are none. To quote one of the YouTubers in

This week I’ve posted several recordings of Paul Whiteman’s big fat orchestra. Above is the big fat man himself, dancing. Sort of. It’s from his 1930 starring vehicle ‘King Of Jazz’ and the name of his body double who does the actual dancing is lost to history. The double does

The other day I posted a 12 inch 78rpm recording of Paul Whiteman’s orchestra playing an extended piece that contained within it a melody that later became ‘Stairway To The Stars’. Whiteman made a number of these mini-symphonette numbers and today I’ve posted one from 1934 called ‘Deep Purple’ which

I Back in the day (by the way–when does that annoying phrase date to? Does ‘back in the day’ date back to ‘back in the day’? I doubt it–it sounds too cutesy–retro. I’m embarrassed to find myself using it, but too late now). Anyway, back in the day the occasional