Moby Dick (1956)

John Huston and Ray Bradbury's classic adaptation of Herman Melville's 1851 novel.

A fresh-faced Richard Basehart stars in the role of our storyteller Ishmael.

Beefheart Basehart went on to play Admiral Nelson

in the TV series 'Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea'

so perhaps he found a niche as the go-to seafaring actor of his day?

The main event here, of course, is Gregory Peck as Captain Ahab.

Greggery Peccary walking the Deckery:

He beckons...

regards

Titus

link

Robert Calvert

Lucky Leif and the Longships (1975)

On the CD release of this LP the spoken word 'Making of Midgard' was subjected

to a despicable 're-mix' which consists of multiple layered echo effects on Bob's voice.

I don't know who sanctioned this but it ruined the track for me

and it has zero merit even as an 'alternative mix'.

This is my slightly tweaked reworking of the album

with the original version of 'Midgard' (ripped from vinyl)

It was produced by Brian Eno and has a very similar sound to Eno's first two solo efforts.

Alongside 1974's 'Captain Lockheed and the Starfighters'

this endures as one of Robert Calvert's finest records.

regards

Titus

01 Ship of Fools

02 The Lay of the Surfers

03 Voyaging to Vinland

04 The Making of Midgard

05 Brave New World

06 Magical Potion

07 Moonshine in the Mountains

08 Storm Chant of the Skraelings

09 Volstead O Vodeo Do

10 Phase Locked Loop

11 Ragna Rock

link

Life After WWI: In Colour (2019)

A documentary that originally aired on More4

(a sister channel to Channel 4).

The series uses vividly colourised archival footage

to chart the aftermath of the First World War.

An oft overlooked period as the focus tends to be,

understandably, on the two world wars.

The "Big Four":

The documentary highlights many things I hadn't really thought about

such as the millions of orphans and the fate of "surplus" young women

who were left in a world with a limited supply of young men.

Georges Clemenceau's unrealistic demands for German reparations

paved the way for Adolf and the Nazis and the arbitrary carving up of territories ,

pretty much, guaranteed future conflict .

When they say "10 dead/100 injured" on the news during any conflict

I'm tempted , maybe subconsciously, to consider the injured as being lucky

or at least luckier.

The shocking reality of some of these injuries is sobering.

We tend to be shown a sanitised version:

The hero who has lost a leg/the Vet who shows you his bullet hole scar.

Many casualties featured here put paid to such romanticised nonsense.

My Dad was born in 1914 and my Mum in 1918

so, for me, this is an insight into the world they grew up in.

regards

Titus

link

Elvin Bishop

KSAN radio

Sausalito, CA

July 8th 1973

Reposted from August 2020

I love Elvin's stuff. It has a great uplifting feel.

Rock, blues, country and a dash of funk.

Reminds me of Little Feat or Ry Cooder at times.

This is a nice recording. Highly recommended.

regards

Titus

01 Travellin' Shoes

02 Little Brother Bill

03 Mockingbird

04 Down in the Valley

05 Piggly Wiggly Blues

06 Stealin' Watermelons

07 I Need Your Lovin' Every Day

link

regards

Titus

Hawkwind

Leas Cliff Hall

Folkestone, England

July 12th 1980

Remastered soundboard.

Early Thatcher-era Hawkwind patched and repaired.

(which took ages especially on Motorway City)

What's not to like? (apart from Thatcher)

Simon King would soon be sacked for bad time keeping.

I'm not sure if that means he couldn't keep the beat

or had a punctuality issue...probably both :)

Huw Lloyd Langton adds some 'proper rock' lead guitar.

Saw Huw play at a tiny local venue in the mid 80s.

He was quite good but turned up very badly prepared.

Audience members had to nip home to get him a distortion pedal because his was broken

and batteries/guitar leads were similarly crowd-sourced.

Eventually we managed to get him equipped and reasonably functioninal.

regards

Titus

Disc 1

01 Shot Down in the Night

02 Motorway City

03 Spirit of the Age

04 Urban Guerilla

05 Prelude/Who's Gonna Win the War?

06 World of Tiers

07 Dust of Time

08 Space Chase

Disc 2

01 Waiting for Nati

02 Lighthouse

03 Brainstorm

04 Master of the Universe

05 Silver Machine/Levitation

06 bonus: (Friday Rock Show 1981)

Tommy Vance interviews Dave Brock & Harvey Bainbridge

link

KRAAN

Taverne am Lützowplatz

Berlin, Germany

March 23rd 1977

Remastered FM.

Just brilliant!

Hellmut Hattler is a fiendish bass player.

Check out his voice 'n' bass spot in 'Hallo Ja Ja, I Don't Know'.

(I believe the appropriate American word would be "awesome")

The tavern on Lützowplatz was located in the so-called Tiergarten triangle

on the site where today's CDU party headquarters is located.

The hall, which offered space for around 3,000 people,

was mainly used as a marquee for a fairground.

Up until 1979 some concerts and festivals also took place there.

regards

Titus

Disc 1

01 improv/Wiederhören

02 Andy Nogger

03 Yaqui Yagua

04 Holiday am Marterhorn

Disc 2

01 Silky Way/Vollgas Ahoi

02 Hallo Ja Ja, I Don't Know

03 Let it Out

bonus:

04 interview with Ingo

link

The cost of gigging crisis (part one: 1977)

Reposted from August 2022

Saw Hawkwind in June 1977 (opening band: Motorhead)

pretty cool huh?

Cool or not my interest here is purely financial.

We note Brock was charging £2.25.

This was fairly average for 1977 and considering Hawkwind

were lugging Atom Henge around/funding Robert Calvert's excesses

I consider it a reasonable tariff.

Our 2nd 1977 concert is Peter Gabriel:

Still a (pre-Biko) upper-class jerk he thinks it's fine to charge £2.80.

N.B. Despite the crappy ZD row position, me and my mate Mike Knowles

snuck down the front and actually watched from about row six!

MAGIC, if a tad expensive for schoolboys on £1 a week pocket money.

Moving on...

Van der Graaf (Generator):

Touring the, then new, album 'The Quiet Zone/The Pleasure Dome'.

Probably the best gig of the three.

And, at £1.50, they win the (admittedly subjective)

Titus Luxor Award for 'People's Champion 1977'.

regards

Titus

The cost of gigging crisis. (part two: 1978)

Reposted from September 2022

You'll have to take my word for it, but this 'D' is in fact Hawkwind.

We see that Mr. Brock has upped his fee to £3.

£2.80 seems to be the standard going rate in 78.

Judas Priest and Steve Hackett being examples:

Perhaps surprisingly, the mighty Meat Loaf only charged £2.50.

So the big man wins the Titus Luxor 'People's Champion of 1978' award.

regards

Titus

Dream Deceivers:

The Story Behind James Vance vs. Judas Priest (1992)

A documentary film about the infamous 1990 civil lawsuit

against the British heavy metal band Judas Priest.

The parents of two teenagers claimed that subliminal messages in the band's music

drove their sons to a suicide pact.

Rob Halford, in particular, deserves recognition and a tip of the hat

for how he dealt with this ridiculous court case.

This is a quite small mp4 file I found on an old HD so should be a quick download.

TIOD  :)

regards

Titus

link

Sorry to see Scotland miss out.

Condolences to my neighbours north of Hadrian's Wall.

Here's the UK  kick-off times and TV channels for the round of 32:

South Africa vs Canada – Sunday June 28 8pm – ITV

Brazil vs Japan – Monday June 29 6pm – ITV

Germany vs Paraguay – Monday June 29 9:30pm – BBC

Netherlands vs Morocco – Tuesday June 30 2am – ITV

Ivory Coast vs Norway – Tuesday June 30 6pm – BBC

France vs Sweden – Tuesday June 30 10pm – ITV

Mexico vs Ecuador – Wednesday July 1 2am – ITV

England vs DR Congo – Wednesday July 1 5pm – BBC

Belgium vs Senegal – Wednesday July 1 9pm – ITV

USA vs Bosnia – Thursday July 2 1am – BBC

Spain vs Austria – Thursday July 2 8pm – BBC

Portugal vs Croatia – Friday July 3 12am – BBC

Switzerland vs Algeria – Friday 3 July 4am – BBC

Australia vs Egypt – Friday 3 July 7pm – BBC

Argentina vs Cape Verde – Friday 3 July 11pm – ITV

Colombia vs Ghana – Saturday 4 July 2:30am – ITV

Might save you the annoying 5 minutes I endured

waiting for The Sun's shitty website to load so I could copy this list.

regards

Titus

Frank Zappa

Pavillon de Paris, France

February 3rd 1977

Remastered (two-source) audience recording.

The second of a two night stint at the Pavillon.

Medium sound quality/brilliant gig.

Probably one for die-hard fans only.

The band includes Eddie Jobson on keyboards and violin*

Former member of "Poxy Music" according to Frank :)

regards

Titus

* check out Serviettes Noires

Disc 1

01 The Purple Lagoon

02 Peaches en Regalia

03 The Torture Never Stops

04 Big Leg Emma

05 City of Tiny Lights

06 A Pound for a Brown on the Bus

07 drum solo

08 Jones Crusher

09 Honey, Don't You Want a Man Like Me?

10 The Illinois Enema Bandit

Disc 2

01 My Guitar Wants to Kill Your Mama

02 Tryin' to Grow a Chin

03 Broken Hearts are for Assholes

04 Dong Work for Yuda

05 Manx Needs Women

06 Titties 'n' Beer

07 Black Napkins

08 Willie the Pimp

09 Dinah-Moe Humm

10 Camarillo Brillo

11 Muffin Man

link

The Servant (1963)

A British psychological drama directed and produced by Joseph Losey

from a screenplay by Harold Pinter, who adapted Robin Maugham's 1948 novella.

It stars Dirk Bogarde, Sarah Miles, Wendy Craig and James Fox.

This one was suggested by Mirta.

Optional multi-subs are included.

regards

Titus

link

Ginger Baker's Jazz Confusion

Cotton Club

Tokyo, Japan

November 22nd 2012

Remastered audience recording.

Not bad but the sound waxes and wanes a bit at times.

This was the first of a three night residency at the Tokyo Cotton Club.

Mostly aimless noodling to my ears.

Ginger famously didn't get on with Jack Bruce.

Jack fell down and broke his crown and Ging came tumbling after?

Actually, now I come to think of it,

"tumbling" is a good description of Ginger Baker's drumming :)

regards

Titus

01 Footprints

02 Twelve and More Blues

03 Cyril Davies

04 Ginger Spice

05 Straight No Chaser

06 St. Thomas

link

Ginger Baker/African Force with Sonny Sharrock

Geneva, Switzerland

March 19th 1987

Reposted from June 2022

Ideal if you are a fan of percussion.

The sound quality is very good.

This gig wore me out a bit if I'm honest but I thought I'd share it

in the hope that it makes all you Cream fans suffer!

You'll be screaming for Sonny to play a note, ANY note, after about 5 minutes.

Palava is the least stressful, sounding almost like Santana.

I once saw Ginger play with Hawkwind.

I'm not sure 'with' is the appropriate word.

regards

Titus

Disc 1

01 untitled

02 Brain Damage

03 untitled

04 Breaking the Poles

Disc 2

01 Palava

02 Want Come, Wait

link

Progglådan Box D: Melodisk Rock

CD 402

Contact/Tomas Wiehe & Tomas Forssell/Trotsålderns Barn/Mobben

This one is a four way split.

Let's dive in...

Contact:

A popular progg outfit who's debut album was produced by Kim Fowley.

Other recordings from those sessions were adapted by Fowley

and released as his 'The Day the Earth Stood Still' L.P.

Not hugely inspiring but I like the sax.

Thomas Wiehe & Tomas Forssell (the spelling of their names varies):

Originally from Malmo, Wiehe moved to the UK at age 16 to study.

There he discovered The Beatles, Tommy Steele, Elvis and The Byrds.

His brother, Mikael, is also a notable musician

known for co-founding the influential progg band Hoola Bandoola Band

and for his extensive solo career.

Thomas and Mikael were both part of the band 'The Moccers; in the 1960s.

Tomas Forssell is a Swedish musician and actor from Stockholm.

He started the rock band Nynningen in Gothenburg in 1970.

This has a pastoral/folk feel which I quite enjoyed.

Trotsålderns Barn (The Children of the Defiant Age):

"The music style was rock and pop with political lyrics.

The influences were Wishbone Ash and Genesis."

Sounds more like a collaboration between Curved Air and The Hatfields.

Really good!

Mobben (The Mob)

Another notable band within the progg movement

who started as a pure blues band in Gävle in 1967.

In 1970 the members moved to Uppsala and became more politically oriented.

Later recordings involved musicians from other notable Swedish bands

including Samla Mammas Manna.

Well executed melodic rock but the song arrangements are a bit bland.

They should have let me play lead guitar all over it :)

The 2nd track is actually a Swedish language version of Free's 'Wishing Well'

the title of which translates to 'You are Tightening Your Door'.

They sound great on the last tune which revisits their blues roots.

regards

Titus

link

The Lost Will of Dr. Rant (1951)

'The Lost Will of Dr. Rant' is an episode of the NBC supernatural series 'Lights Out'.

Other than this I know nothing about 'Lights Out'.

Adapted from M.R. James's story 'The Tractate Middoth', it stars a young Leslie Nielsen.

Always difficult to take Leslie's 'serious acting'...erm...seriously

but he was in some good stuff including the sci-fi classic 'Forbidden Planet'

before diving into the algae-ridden refecting pool of 'taking-everything-literally' comedy.

This is notable to M.R. James afficionados for being the first ever TV adaptation.

It's a bare bones telling of the plot-line with little or no attempt

to convey any of the atmosphere that made M.R. James a giant of the genre.

To be fair it's only short and I believe these programs were basically filmed live

with little or no time/money for re-takes pre editing.

I remastered the audio as it was far too quiet.

BTW I'm always open to requests/suggestions for old film or TV.

regards

Titus

link

World War 1 in colour (2003)

Part 7

Bonus material:

CGI special: Tactics & Strategy

Making the Series: interviews with the production team

Bloodthirsty readers fear not.

More War coming soon as we continue our retrospective

on the follies of the first half of the 20th century.

regards

Titus

link

In Bed with MeDinner is an old favourite of mine.

Created by Bob Mills who pioneered a style of comedy

which became the template for people like Harry Hill.

The humour is 'pre-seeded' with the punch lines coming later.

Hard to describe but very funny at times.

You probably need to be British and over 50 to get all the cultural references.

I found an old DVD I made which has a few episodes.

They were ripped from a VHS tape.

Bob had musical guests but unfortunately the clips of the bands were edited out

because the VHS producers did not have the rights to the music.

Buzzcocks were featured on this episode.

The first three series opened with a parody of The Prisoner

while the fourth and final series was re-titled Still In Bed With MeDinner,

and the opening sequence changed to a parody of the classic Avengers TV show.

The audio was a bit poor so I gave it a remaster.

regards

Titus

link

Rush

Stadthalle Offenbach
Offenbach am Main
Germany
May 28th 1979

Reposted from May 2020

Here's the three amigos thrashing away on their Hemispheres tour.

Well known soundboard that goes by many names.
Black Forest, Hemispheres in Frankfurt etc.
Doubt the good folks of Offenbach would appreciate being tagged as Frankfurt!
They first played in Germany in 1977 and they were Offenbach (sorry)
Mrs. Luxor is German and she says she had never heard of Rush before coming to the UK.
But Germans think Barclay James Harvest are as good as Led Zeppelin.
And Saga are the best thing since sliced sauerkraut.
I saw Rush on this tour about a month prior to this recording.

Support was from the wonderful Max Webster

who were promoting their Million Vacations album at the time.
Which is a better album than anything Rush ever did IMO.
There were free Max Webster promotional flexi-discs left on each seat.

Might still have one somewhere.
I remember Kim Mitchel in his long stripy socks.
I still have the ticket...£3.50...which a quick google told me
is equivalent to £17.50 in today's money.
About the price of two beers at the venue bar now. If you're lucky!
regards
Titus

Disc 1

01 - Intro
02 - Anthem
03 - A Passage To Bangkok
04 - By-Tor & the Snow Dog
05 - Xanadu
06 - Something For Nothing
07 - The Trees
08 - Cygnus X-1
09 - Hemispheres
10 - Closer To The Heart

Disc 2

01 - A Farewell To Kings
02 - La Villa Strangiato
03 - 2112
04 - Working Man
05 - Bastille Day
06 - In The Mood
07 - Drum Solo

link

The Holy Trinity is the foundational Christian belief that there is one God

who exists in three distinct, co-eternal persons:

God the Father, God the Son (a.k.a. Jesus Christ) and God the Holy Spirit.

Prior to that there must have been a Holy Duo.

God the Father added God the Son to the board of directors.

Jesus would always vote with Dad leaving The Holy Spirit somewhat side-lined.

It was a miracle...the first nepo baby.

I googled 'Jesus nepo baby' after writing this post.

Here's what I found :)

regards

Titus

Jack Bruce (with Joe Bonamassa)

Royal Festival Hall

London, UK

June 4th 2011

Remastered audience recording.

The performance served as a tribute to Gary Moore.

Gary was scheduled to play but, sadly,  he pased away in February 2011.

regards

Titus

Disc 1

The Big Blues Band

01 Every Day I Have the Blues

02 Roll and Tumble Blues

03 Doobre

Jack Bruce replaces Nick Cohen

04 Send for Me

05 Never Tell Your Mother She's Out of Tune

06 First Time I Met the Blues

07 Neighbor, Neighbor

08 This Anger's a Liar

09 Born Under a Bad Sign

Disc 2

01 We're Going Wrong

Joe Bonamassa joins in

02 Midnight Blues

03 Theme for an Imaginary Western

04 White Room

05 Politician

06 Sunshine of Your Love

07 Spoonful

link

Thunderbolt and lightning, very, very frightening me.

France vs Iraq was delayed at half-time for two hours due to a storm.

Fifa has no power to make its own rules, it must adhere to the advice of local authorities.

In the United States (home of the brave),

recommendations of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are used.

The NOAA says that if any lightning strike is detected within eight miles of a stadium

the game has to be stopped.

How would that work out distance-wise in the UK?

If you are in Manchester at Old Trafford or the Etihad,

you can just about get away with lightning in Rochdale.

A game could continue at Stamford Bridge if there was an electrical storm

at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium - but it would be too close

if lightning was at Emirates Stadium.

There might be an issue if there are electrical storms around the final group games,

which are supposed to be played simultaneously.

If one game is halted, will Fifa have to stop the other one, too?

My solution? Just play through the bloody storm softies!

Austria goalkeeper Florian Wiegele is the tallest player at the 2026 World Cup.

His height is 2.05 m (6 ft 9 in)

If they adopt my suggestion put a small wager on him to be hit by lightning first.

regards

Titus