Fwak Grab Bag

Fun on the Dark Side

BBC: The Devil's Music
(West Side Story's "Maria"! Who knew?)

Via Rebecca's Pocket:- How To Dance Gothic
(...and achieving the proper level of angst)

WHICH WAY IS THE EXIT? Put your arms out to both sides, like you’re being crucified or something. As you do, swirl around once or twice, but remember to do it slowly, not quick like a little kid trying to get dizzy. If you do it right, this one can have some of the feel of time wheeling onward, the spin of the earth around the sun, and so on. It can also come in handy in case some weirdo DJ puts on Dead or Alive’s “You Spin Me Right Round, Baby”. (“Right ’round like a record, baby, right ’round, ’round, ’round.” Oh, yeah.)

Variations: This is one the most personalizable of all the moves here. You don’t even need to put both arms out; you can keep one in front of your body (ready to do some other move), or put it behind your back, or you can put it up to your forehead to show how angst-ridden you truly are.

Jamaica Sound System

More nifty illustrations here at Studio-Uprising.

Frantics!

Eddie has a few of the DADDY ROTH and WEIRD-OHS kits back in Sydney, but wow... check out this FRANTICS set by HAWK. Looks really cool and I'd love to have it! I'm getting 3 of these! whee....

Box Art by Bill Campbell

Via ComicBookResources:

As for the Weird-Ohs (which the gremlins in this issue’s cover-story closely resemble, these hot rod monsters first appeared as a series of plastic model kits issued by the Hawk Model Company. An attempt to compete with Revell’s line of Ed “Big Daddy” Roth’s bug-eyed “finks” (led by the iconic “Rat Fink”) and Monogram’s model kits of Stanley Mouse!’s “Fred Flypogger” and friends, the Weird-Ohs were created and designed by illustrator Bill Campbell in 1963. The original trio of Weird-Ohs consisted of Davey (a biker), Digger (a drag racer) and Daddy (a suburban commuter), who were eventually joined by such plastic “car-icky-tures” as Leaky Boat Louie, Freddy Flameout, Endsville Eddie, Drag Hag, Wade A. Minit, Francis The Foul, Huey’s Hut Rod, Sling Rave Curvette, Killer McBash and others. These led to Hawk’s similar lines of “Frantics” and “Silly Surfers”. The model kits themselves were designed and engineered by Hawk/Testor’s bigshot John (Zawicki) Andrews. In 1993, Testor’s re-released many of the original Weird-Ohs. A few years later, Mainframe Entertainment produced the, CGI-animated TV series starring the WEIRD-OHS, which premiered on FoxKids Network on October 9, 1999 (and released to home video in 2000) but it failed to capture the appealingly manic quality of the original kits.

Somewhat related link: Our character designs for Endsville.

Musical Oddities

Musical Prototypes Via Ektopia:

[Notewriter]

[Old School Portable Beat Machine]

For the Real Deal, some cool online galleries:

--> Audio Playground Keyboard Museum
--> IEEE Virtual Museum - Songs In The Key of E
--> Raymond Scott Studio Pictures
--> Oddmusic Gallery

This is not to say that I personally have any idea how these work or what makes them historically/conceptually special. They just look very cool.

[Fairlight]

[Stylophone]

[Wall of Sound]

[classic theremin]

[Riday T91]

 

• Ondes Martenot
• Stylophone
• Mellotron
• Videola

 

Audio --> Visual

These customized keyboards by Mr. Ugly are funny and cool. Via GetLofi.com.

Subcultures: Part 2

ROCKABILLY:

ELECTRO:

GOTH:

Copyright 2005 Lili Chin & Eddie Mort (photo BGs found via Google images)

Subcultures: Part 1

SKINHEADS

MODS

REGGAE

[by Lili & Eddie. London photo-BGs via Google Images]

Sounds of Underground London

Via The Video Beat!:

Teddy Boys, Mods, Skinheads, and Northern Soul.
2003 U.K. ITV1 TV documentary series. "S.O.U.L. – Sounds Of Underground London" is a multi-part series examining England's prominent youth culture scenes and the music and fashion that surrounded them. The series celebrated 50 years of English youth culture.

Ordered!

So, there are only 4 episodes on this DVD, and I am curious how many episodes there are in the entire series. I read somewhere that there’s an “Acid Jazz” episode.. Where can we get more episodes? Does anyone know? (Google has not been helpful.)

*UPDATE. That was awesome. And I knew there had to be more episodes...

Coonskin

Screengrabs from Ralph Bakshi’s COONSKIN… design/staging reference.

 

 

Samurai Champloo Colors

Screengrabs from the Samurai Champloo opening titles. Great color-styling reference.