Imagine stepping off the V train in the Lower East Side; the streets are crowded with people from all walks of life, uniting under one rhythm in funky, colorful 80’s gear that we all try so hard to revive (and forget). Well, that’s pretty much what “unusual” singing sensation Cyndi Lauper had in mind when she shot the video for her hit single “Girls Just Want To Have Fun” on the streets if NY in 1983:

It’s a party in the N-Y-C, and Cyndi Lauper brought out the best (& worst) of the 80’s. While hip-hop rocked rope chains, bamboo earrings, Adidas, and acid wash jeans, Pop’s bad girls did the “Molly Ringwald” dance in leg warmers, leotards, oversized off the shoulder sweaters, and stacked bangles. Oh, and you can’t ever forget the tutu! For this week’s “Vintage Video” my treat to you is the party anthem of the 80’s. Because, after all, girls just want to have fun! The times & style’s may change, but that won’t. I have chosen a select few items that have the aesthetic of this video, emphasis on aesthetic. Just the vibe, quite impossible to get the exact threads.

SKIRT: Exposed Zip Mesh Skirt $13.99

BRACELETS: Rock Chick Gold Wristwear Set $27.20

EARRINGS: Enamelled Fan Drop Earrings $13.60

DRESS: Mink Pink Floral Belted Shirt Dress $110.48

CHAIN BELT: Interwoven Satin Chain Belt $7.80

HAT: Wool Felt Fedora $10.80

GLOVES: Leather Tarnished Stud Fingerless Gloves $30.59

Whether it was inspired by one of Cyndi’s iconic dresses and accessories in this video, or one of her million many extra’s and dancers, the Queens native pretty much swallowed the 80’s and spit it out on the streets of Manhattan.

Following today’s cricket score at White Hart Lane we at TheGoldenBoot thought we’d bring you a vintage big score game. Apologies for the VHS ecorded quality.

Great to see some vintage players, Brian McClair, Andrei Kanchelskis and poor old C raig Forrest in goal.

Once upon a time, artists had recognizable brands, and style consistency. Videos had cohesiveness and everything just went. Now-a-days, videos are just thrown together with racks of clothing pulled from various showrooms, back up dancers doing their own thing, and half-naked chickadees. In the days of burgeoning icons and taste makers, the back up dancers matched the artists, and there was one consistent style through out. To reprise the era of the iconic video, an era which is no longer, I am adding a new feature called “Vintage Video” (name subject to change) where I will pull style’s inspired by the video. First up, in honor of her #1’s album that dropped yesterday:

Janet Jackson-”Rhythm Nation”, 1989

The hoop-key earrings, baseball caps, leather gloves, black denim jeans, and biker boots. Janet did the “all black everything” first!

JACKET: Marc by Marc Jacobs Jasmine Bow-front Jacquard Jacket $390

*To get a darker, edgier look like Janet in RN, add six silver buttons (varying in sizes) to the front of your jacket

PANTS: J Brand Skinny Leg Jeans $150

SHOES: Vivienne Westwood Suede Pirate Boots $510

EARRINGS: Sterling Silver Heart Key Earrings $16.75

*Rock in one ear, or just take a lightweight silver key, and attach it to a silver hoop earring.

GLOVES: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1: Dents Luxury Soft Leather Cashmere Lined Gloves $74.79

HAT: Fred Perry Baseball Cap $33.99

Until next time! Also, if you have any video’s in mind for me to feature, drop them in the comment box! I would love to know what your favorite “Vintage Video” is!

To celebrate today’s highly debated friendly we’ll have 2 classic moments from England vs Brazil matches in the days of yore.

First, possibly the greatest save ever from 1970. Won’t be expecting anything similar today given our current crop of goalkeeping ‘talent’.

And secondly from the 2002 World Cup a spectacular mugging of an old man with a ponytail. Complete with over the top commentary.

WIll be a good chance to see a few of the fringe players get a chance but essentially it is an England ‘B’ international against one of the more boring Brazil teams in history. Good luck to the boys anyway.

The Tremeloes (click here for today’s Vintage Video) had what it took to give The Beatles a run for their money in the mid-60s. Catchy tunes, good looks, respectably long hair, a supportive record label (Decca) and a growing legion of fans. But the recipe didn’t bake cake, and the Fab Four pasted the Tremeloes in the race to British Invasion superstardom. That left Brian Poole (lead singer and guitarist) and his bandmates to swallow their pride, which wasn’t hard to do with more than a dozen British #1’s and two Top 20 US hits. The Tremeloes broke up in 1970, just a few short years after they recorded this version of their hit cover of Cat Stevens’ “Here Comes My Baby” in 1967 for the BBC.

Dr. Rock’s take on the best 50 tracks from the British Invasion includes another Tremeloes hit song, “Silence Is Golden”, also from 1967.

Lip-synching on music shows aired from a TV studio was an accepted practice in the 60s and early 70s. But a growing trend toward “real” live performances is evidenced by Poco’s rendition (click here) of “A Good Feelin’ To Know” on a TV/radio simulcast with album-rock station WPLJ-fm in New York in 1972. The song was the title track to the fifth studio album from one of the longest running country-rock bands. The line-up pictured here was their early 70s version. Founding member, lead vocalist and guitarist Richie Furay would leave in a year, bassist Tim Schmit went to the Eagles in 1977 and drummer George Grantham quit in 1978. Guitarists Rusty Young and Paul Cotton continued on with various replacements in the 80s and the band continues performing to this day. Poco is in the Playlist Vault at DrRock.com and A Good Feelin’ To Know is available from Amazon and iTunes.

Long before MTV, The Mamas & The Papas lip-synched through a truncated version of their signature tune, “California Dreaming” on The Ed Sullivan Show (click here) in December 1966. The single was released in 1965 and peaked at #4 in the U.S., one of 11 Top 40 charters they had in their all-too-brief, four-year career as a working folk-pop band. Had they been around 20 years later, they might have had even greater success and longevity. But John Phillips controlled things too much for certain members, and “Mama” Cass Elliott bowed out of the “family” in 1968. John’s “control” extended beyond his bandmates, as we’ve recently heard from his now-50-year-old daughter, Mackenzie. Is she waiting (at 7 years) obediently back stage for her Papa? (The Mamas & The Papas are in the Playlist Vault at DrRock.com).

Shindig. Hulabaloo. Soul Train. Kraft Music Hall. The Midnight Special. Remember them? They’re all iconic 60s and 70s TV music programs that aired on the major U.S. networks and featured the hottest bands of the day lip-synching and fake playing their way through the hits of the day. And the Dave Clark Five’s appearance (click here) on Shindig in 1965 was typical of a mid-60s British Invasion challenge to the Beatles’ dominance. “Catch Us If You Can” was the DC5’s good-time signature song and made it to #4 in the U.S. in the fall of 1965. Shindig aired on ABC for about 18 months until January 1966 when it was replaced by a new series called Batman. Holy cow!

Well, let’s be honest. We’re trying to finalize the designs for our next sock collection and we’ve hit a small inspiration wall. We’ve got lots of great ideas, but we are still missing that magic element.

At times like these, we turn to You Tube. Pop culture artifacts explode all over that site, including this one:

We didn’t (or, at least, haven’t yet) found that missing magic element in this ’70s dance segement, but check out those socks! You just can’t go wrong with colored knickers and striped knee socks.

Very Andre 3000.

The Midnight Special was a successful music variety show which aired on NBC at 1:00 a.m. on Saturday mornings following The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. The program aired from 1973 until 1981 and featured “live” performances, in contrast to the often blatant lip-synching that most other, similar programs offered. The Midnight Special’s run ended when Dick Ebersol, the show’s producer, was shifted over to the ailing Saturday Night Live. Ebersol brought the notion of live rock performances to SNL. In this Vintage Video clip from 1973, the Doobie Brothers perform their #11 hit, “Listen To The Music” from the album Toulouse Street. The Doobies are in Dr. Rock’s Playlist Vault and Toulouse Street is available for or as a CD.

At first listen, The Turtles seemed to be just another late 60s upbeat pop-rock harmony band. On closer inspection, however, they were more than that. Led by sarcastic frontmen Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman and singing tongue-in-cheek lyrics with beautiful harmonies, the Turtles vamped and camped their way to the top of the AM charts for an all-too-brief time in the late 60s. And their performance of “Elenore” on NBC’s Kraft Music Hall show in September 1968 (click here for the video) is ultimate Turtles: Kaylan in a lounge-style tuxedo; overgrown (in hair and stature) Volman overacting on back-up vocals; and the infectious sound and simple-minded lyrics of “Elenore” that Kaylan actually penned as a protest to the very notion of AM pop hits. Unfortunately, the Turtles were gone by 1970. Luckily for us, Kaylan and Volman joined Frank Zappa’s irreverent Mothers Of Invention, then recorded five FM radio-friendly albums in the late 70s before returning to the oldies circuit in the 80s. They’re still touring as The Turtles, and I recommend you see them (as I did last summer). They make for a great show. (“Elenore” appears on the excellent concept album, The Turtles Present The Battle Of The Bands, which is on Amazon and . A Turtles playlist is in Dr. Rock’s Playlist Vault.)

The New Riders Of The Purple Sage performed “Hello Mary Lou” on the German public TV program, Beat-Club, which premiered in 1965 and went off the air in December 1972, six months after this video was taped. The song was co-written by country-pop-rocker Gene Pitney and became a hit for Ricky Nelson in 1961. The New Riders included “Hello Mary Lou” on their second album, Powerglide, in 1972 and it was a staple of their live shows and albums thereafter. (For New Riders CDs and track downloads, check Amazon, and the New Riders playlist in Dr. Rock’s Playlist Vault).

Dick Smothers introduced Paul Revere & The Raiders as a “group of youngsters” for their performance (click here) of “Ups And Downs” on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in 1967, about two years before the controversial CBS program was cancelled due to its anti-establishment content. “Ups and Downs” was in the middle of the band’s string of eight straight Billboard Top 25 hits between 1965 and 1968. That was the peak of their popularity, although they would chart several more singles and continue releasing albums well into the 70s. Paul Revere & The Raiders appear in several playlists in Dr. Rock’s Playlist Vault.

“Summer In The City” was a #1 hit for the Lovin’ Spoonful in (when else?) the summer of 1966 and appeared on the band’s November 1966 album, Hums Of The Lovin’ Spoonful, which made it to #14 on the Billboard charts.  Click here for a video of the band lip-synching and faking the instruments (except drummer Joe Butler on a scaled-down drum set) on an unidentified TV program for the same year. Hums Of The Lovin’ Spoonful is available on Amazon and and The Lovin’ Spoonful is in Dr. Rock’s Playlist Vault.

Few bands rocked and rolled as hard as the J. Geils Band did on stage. Click here and watch their performance of “Looking For A Love” on the German TV showcase program Rockpalast in 1979 as evidence of their hard driving, relentless live shows. Rockpalast is the longest running televised rock program anywhere. Since 1974, hundreds of rock acts have appeared on the program, which continues its weekly broadcast on WDR (Westdeutscher-Rundfunk) and is seen throughout Europe.  “Looking For A Love” is on the band’s second LP, The Morning After (1971) and a live version with the same energy as in this video is on “Live” Full House from 1972. J. Geils Band will be in Dr. Rock’s Playlist Vault soon.

Only drummer Jerry Edmonton is really playing in this June 1969 video of Steppenwolf “performing” their 1968 hit, “Born To Be Wild” (click here) on the pop music showcase program Beat-Club. The show aired from 1965 to 1972 on Germany’s national TV. “Born To Be Wild” revs up the start of the cult movie, Easy Rider and is widely credited for introducing the term “heavy metal,” even though the lyrics suggest it’s an homage to biking on the open road as opposed to the soon-to-be-introduced splinter of hard rock (“I like smoke and lightning/Heavy metal thunder/Racin’ with the wind/And the feelin’ that I’m under…”). Steppenwolf is in Dr. Rock’s Playlist Vault.

Oh where does the time go?

Skinny Pixel Technologies not posted in a good while because we have been very busy.

To get everyone up to date:

Our Video Department hard at work and creating some wonderful vintage films about fishing and fishing conservation down in the Florida Keys. Also our video department just received 3 new HD helmet cameras for shooting action and sports events like never before.

Our Photography Department recently received over $10,000 worth of new state of the art equipment to advance their capabilities.

Also our Architectural Department is finishing up a wonderful project and has made significant improvements with their new 3D home and building design capabilities. We will be launching a new website outlining these capabilities soon.

Skinny now offers several new Email services:
Advanced email signatures – with texting, web links, and custom graphics for a onetime fee of $135

Standard Email Signature – with links and custom graphics for a onetime fee of $75

Basic Email signature – Custom graphics onetime fee of $50

We also offer custom email newsletters and layouts that are very impressive and affordable without a monthly fee.

Future:
Skinny Pixel has been in talks with SAIC about doing some work in Afghanistan. With our 3D knowledge and process capabilities we hope to help in our countries efforts to improve solider protection and knowledge of the Afghan landscape.

We are also talking with several Navy fighter squadrons on the creation of new advanced web sites with significant improvements by using and integrating video.

Skinny’s new Microsites are due to launch in a few more months. These sites will take interested clients to websites that are only about the service they are looking for. Example a client interested in web design will have the option to go to a Skinny Microsite that has only information about web design in a small concise manner.

New Video Service: -RETRO Pictures- For commercials and website integration. Skinny is changing the face of modern advertising by bring back the great design and feel of vintage advertising. more info soon

Thanks for the read,
Rob

Click here for a double-shot video of The Grass Roots performing two of their late-60s hits, “Bella Linda” and “Midnight Confessions,” on what appears to be Playboy After Dark (is that pipe-smoking stud-type Hugh Hefner on the right in the audience shots?). There were several incarnations of The Grass Roots between 1966 and 1975, each barely related to its predecessor but able to chart multiple AM pop hits. Somewhat like the Monkees, they were a manufactured band, in this case led by songwriter P.F. Sloan (he wrote “Eve Of Destruction” and others) and career-producer Steve Barri (he produced “Midnight Confessions”, and countless other 60s/70s/80s hits and bands). Enjoy!

“The Weight” is the signature song by The Band, one of the best known songs from the late 60s and one of the top folk-rock tunes of all time. It was released as a single off their debut album, Music From Big Pink, in June 1968. In November two years later, The Band performed “The Weight” live at the Syria Mosque, a popular concert venue in Pittsburgh, PA. Click here for a vintage video of “The Weight,” which includes lengthy shots of drummer Levon Helm, lead guitarist Robbie Robertson and bassist Rick Danko, but unfortunately lacks any views of organist Garth Hudson and only shows pianist Richard Manuel from behind at the end.

 Choke No Joke and the “THis is Choke No Joke” documentary sent over this exclusive treat….more vintage footage from the days of the Tunnel Nightclub. This time, featuring performances by Meth and Red, Black Rob, Beanie Sigel etc. But honestly, my favorite parts of the video are the crowd shots. So brings backs memories. I definitely made a point of dressing down on Tunnel Sundays…as in sweatsuit, running sneakers, ponytail, lipgloss, lol. Play the wall, grab a plate of not-great West Indian food as a last resort, and avoid the co-ed bathrooms : )

-missinfo

Stunning rare footage of a fire-eating couple from the 1960s. How do people reach a decision to do this. Were they just sitting around the dinner table one evening and he turned to her and said  “Babe, I have a great idea on how to spice up our lives” and being the 1960’s she of course agreed and said “It’ll be groovy, but what will I wear” “Oh, I have something in mind.” he said with a mischievious grin. Well, this is definitely one way to keep things hot in a marriage. I know it is not suppose to be funny, but it is and hey! there are days I would like to shoot a flaming arrow at my husband too.

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It’s tough to tell, but watch this vintage video and try not to get in the sexy mood by listening to the background music and staring at those magical tight perm curls. I must excuse myself now. 

Thirty years ago today, the now infamous “accident” in Unit 2 at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, about 90 minutes from where I live (downwind), took place.

In 1979, I was a junior in college, still living at home in South Jersey.  I have to tell you that we were all terrified.  This was a very scary time.  The local media was fixated on the event, but I to this day believe that they consistently downplayed the real level of danger.  In the years since then, there is ample evidence that we were all hoodwinked, that things were a LOT worse than what we were told, that what really happened was much closer to what happened in the Hollywood version of a similar event (in the film The China Syndrome), which eerily foreshadowed the real-life “incident” by twelve days.  The previous fall, after reading a book by Amory Lovins, I had been involved in forming an anti-nuclear power student group at Temple University.  It was first adult experience with activism.  It changed me.  It also caused a rift with my engineer father which took a long time to heal, especially when I was involved in organizing marches and demonstrations that involved civil disobedience.  TMI only served to radicalize me even more, and that caused even more arguments at home.

I thought I was right.  I still do.

I get very uncomfortable these days when, in light of our drive towards dealing with global climate change and in our desire to wean ourselves off of carbon-based energy, we get all warm and fuzzy about refocusing on nuclear as a viable option for generating electricity.  I still remember those days.  I still remember that fear.  That fear was justified, as it turns out.  It was valid.  This is not about Chicken Little hysteria.  This is about balancing our desire for more energy with life and death, literally, for ourselves and our children and the very environment we seek to protect.  Global climate change is a slow-motion disaster that we need to deal with.  A full-blown nuclear accident could kill millions in a few days.

Thirty-one years later, I’m still against nuclear power.

And I can’t imagine that I’ll ever change.

In case you missed it…