Matt Damon, a lifelong friend of Howard Zinn and his family, read excerpts from a speech Howard Zinn gave in 1970 as part of a debate on civil disobedience.
Father-Daughter Team Up To Build Musical Stairs For Their House
Ivan Owen and his daughter threw themselves onto this idea of hooking some antique organ pipes to their front steps. The result: One confused pizza delivery driver.
https://youtu.be/d8B_fKmBDAs
How Pixar Animators Solved The Problem Of McQueen Having No Hands
Reasons why I could never be an animator. I would never think of the problem of a talking car not being able to pick up anything, nevermind the solution.
Factory Records Doc: Manchester from Joy Division to Happy Mondays
Documentary celebrating the triumph, tragedy and human comedy that was Manchester record company, Factory. Started by the late Tony Wilson, Alan Erasmus, Peter Saville and Martin Hannett in the late 1970s, it became known as the home of Joy Divsion, New Order and Happy Mondays and for creating the Hacienda club. The label pioneered Britain’s independent pop culture, creating a new Manchester and blowing a shed-load of money. The doc includes interviews with all the main players in the Factory story, and well worth watching, even if you’ve seen the great docudrama/comedy 24 Hour Party People.
Jerry Weintraub: How I Fooled Elvis Presley
One of your early triumphs was managing Elvis Presley’s tours. On one of the first concert dates, you narrowly avoided a complete disaster in Miami.
Jerry Weintraub: When I first met Elvis he said, “Don’t ever put me in a show that’s not sold out.” When I got to the first show and there were 5,000 seats left in a10,000-seat arena for the matinee. The only thing I could figure out was to take the seats out. He asked me when he came into the show, “How we doing?” I said, “Every seat is full.” I didn’t say, “Sold out,” I said, “Every seat is full.”
Via The Wrap
Infographic: The Value of a Single Music Stream
This infographic shows the reality of today’s music business: billions of streams, each one requiring precise metadata and tracking, that pay fractions of a cent to rights holders and even less to creators. We’re not in a transition of dollars to pennies. Today’s digital music business is collecting as many fractions of pennies as possible.
Via Billboard
The sailors who brought back records from the US to the UK
One solitary record changed Bill Harrison’s life. He was a 15-year-old lad from Liverpool, walking down to his local sports centre, when he heard a bewitching sound coming from someone’s window.
“I sat on the wall to listen,” he says, “and this chap came out in a beautiful midnight blue suit and a pair of oxblood slip-on shoes with a brass bull’s head on the top. I thought, ‘This fellow’s a film star!’”
He wasn’t a film star, though. He was a seaman – one of the famed Cunard Yanks, whose journeys took them around the world, giving them access to the records and clothes you could only buy in the US. The song that had transfixed Harrison was Settin’ the Woods on Fire by Hank Williams, which the mystery seaman explained he had found in Texas. He promised Harrison that such treasures awaited him, too, should he choose to join the merchant navy.
And so began a long career at sea in which Harrison and his colleagues performed dual roles: their day jobs (in Harrison’s case, working his way up the ship’s kitchens); and the arguably more vital role of bringing back American imports with which to wow the locals. These imports included everything from fridge freezers to Wrangler jeans, but it was the early rock’n’roll, soul and blues records that would really go on to change the course of history. Sam Cooke, Fats Domino, Buddy Holly, Roy Hamilton, Billy Eckstine: all these sounds were soaked up by the local musicians who would go on to form Merseybeat bands such as the Searchers, Gerry and the Pacemakers and – of course – the Beatles.
Via The Guardian
Reporter Is Grace Under Pressure When A Lamb Urinates On Him
A reporter found himself being upstaged when a lamb decided to relieve itself while he was filming a piece to camera. BBC News NI’s Agriculture and Environment Correspondent Conor Macauley was reporting on how Button had been adopted by a couple from Moira, when the lamb urinated. Keep a stiff upper lip, and all…
https://youtu.be/-Jwcg6ln8Gw
Having A Bad Day? The Tiny Tunes Band Will Cheer You Up
Meet the Tiny Tunes band. They perform songs about the important things in life. Serious subjects like eating steaks, robot legs, seeing a doctor, haircuts and sharing.
This flowchart from 1957 shows Disney’s strategy for corporate growth
Made to cash in on the groundbreaking films of Disney, the company issued a flowchart that is likely still used to this day. Actually, because it reinvented the brand completely in entertainment, it provides a roadmap for every business in film, television, books and music.