Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Help, the Slow Poisoner has gotten to me!



The multi-talented Andrew Goldfarb, the Slow Poisoner (and best thing to come out of the San Francisco area since Tee And Thee Crumpets), has recorded and released some excellent and atmospheric yet kick-butt music over the past few years and you might just do yourself a favor to investigate his CDs and comic books. His Roadside Altar and Magic Casket albums have been getting a few spins here and I'm looking forward to discovering the new Lost Hills set!



According to current plans you can also catch his act in Seattle at The Funhouse (across from the Space Needle) on Sunday March 25th 2012 if you dare!

www.theslowpoisoner.com

www.ognerstump.com

Sunday, January 08, 2012

Clickety-click, Barbatrick!

Everyone knows that You Tube is a great place to look up all the obscure old tv shows you remember but nobody else does. Here in Canada we often saw British programs, but also shows from other countries dubbed into English (and on the French language channel au Francaise). One I fondly remember is a Dutch or Belgian kiddie show dubbed into English called Barbapapa. It featured a family of blobby characters with different colours and personalities. One of the blobby things was Barba-Bo, a sort of hippie artist who addresses other creatures as 'man' as you can find out below.



Other such shows I enjoyed were Vision On, Hattytown, Simon In The Land Of Chalk Drawings, and I have vague memories of a show about two mice in French called Nik & Pik who rode in a miniature hot air balloon. I'm sure I'll find them eventually on You Tube. Vision On included an actor named Sylvester McCoy who went on to play Doctor Who. Later on I became quite fascinated with a sci-fi show called The Tomorrow People. That series has been made available on DVDs playable in North America finally and you bet I've ordered all of them! I'm afraid I missed one series based on The Owl Service book, and another titled Children Of The Stones (which are both supposed to be a little along the lines of The Wicker Man), but I did follow something involving a Phoenix but no idea what the title was now. Maybe some of my readers in Old Blighty can help with that? I have ordered The Children Of The Stones DVD but there doesn't seem to be an Owl Service that will work in North America as yet. I was a little old for it when it came out but I also remember a kiddie show with the voice of Peter Ustinov called Dr. Snuggles and it had a sort of yobbo sounding Badger in overalls. I think I'll see if I can find that right now...

The new header graphic by the way is of a movie theater in Seattle Erik once worked at. I've personalized it and it's neighbors (a comic book shop and a deli) just a little bit). There is a very good music store underneath called Neptune Music with lots of quality vinyl, not to be confused with Vancouver's Neptoon which is equally renowned. Down the road a ways is a Dick's drive-in hamburger place with amazing fries!