Versus

I've been meaning to do this for a while: a semi-regular mostly-irregular posting called "Versus," in which two artists doing their versions of the same song are pitted against each other to see whose version wins. The first entry was going to Screamin' Jay Hawkins and Arthur Brown, doing "I Put A Spell On You," but that's going to have to wait.



Mickey and Sylvia's "Love is Strange"...



...and Buddy Holly's version. Unfortunately for Mr. Holly, the strings kill his version. Supposedly (according to the comments on the YouTube page) the strings were dubbed in after his untimely death at 22, so they can't be held against him at all. Supposedly there's a demo version that is more bare-bones, so I'll have to seek that one out. But in this case...

MICKEY AND SYLVIA WIN!

Like a Sinner Before the Gates of Heaven...

     Hope you got waves this weekend. I fell in love with the traditional thruster again. Fun! Fun! Fun! This time of year is amazing as it's really bristling with the energy everything - people, places, plants - coming alive.
That's all for now.

This song, and all the outlandishly wonderful Meat Loaf songs that matter (all of first album, some of second) really resonate "Spring" in me. Maybe it's memories of Hub City vernal celebration sing-a-longs to 45s and LPs at full volume (this is the one time of the year I really become nostalgic for NB most), or maybe it's the carpe-diem everything-be-damned rock 'n' roll songwriting attitude of Jim Steinman, but a good Meat Loaf  song is something to come alive to.

Book It!

    May I present the first project to come out of the newly redone Strange Flora surfboard manufacturing facility: a bookshelf. After I finished 007, I told myself I wouldn't do another board until I finished this thing, so I did. Put it up about a week ago, at which point my life was plunged into disarray. Putting the records away was relatively easy: they get sorted alphabetically, with the only genre categorization being hardcore/punk records (which I can never bring to mix into the fray), V/A collections, soundtracks, and Christmas records. The biggest challenge is not spending so much time looking at the sleeves as I realize, yet again, that the record is the be-all end-all of music formats, not only for audio quality but sleeve art. So that part was easy.

     Putting the books away presented a problem. My first inclination is to sort alphabetically, but then I run into problems. Sometimes I feel like putting authors' influences near next to them (Pynchon with Wallace, Thomas Wolfe with Kerouac, Ballard with Palahniuk, etc.), or sometimes I want to put books that I discovered at a certain time in my life next to each other. What to do if an author who wrote predominantly fiction also has some collections of poetry, or perhaps a play? Can I bring myself to cross-pollinate genres? And something in me just doesn't feel right putting a lesser author next to a great one.
     But don't worry, in the end, I figured it out, and I actually got rid of some books along the way. And to reward me Oceanus sent that amazing swell on Monday with a head-high-plus south-end solo session to kick off the day, before the maddening crowd got wind that it was amazing down there, and promptly swooped in. It was a magnificent day, one of the best swells in a while and it lasted all day, and when I say that I mean after sundown it was still amazing. Truly a blessing. And more on the way.

     On the board front, picked up this board the other day: It's a 6'8" Hansen Superlight Mini with 3/4 length stringer and some cool pinlines. It's in rough shape, but I'm going to give restoring it a go, and see what happens. Cheaper than a blank, anyway, and it looks like a really fun shape.

50 Years From Now...

....when all the Judd Apatows, Will Ferrells, Seth Rogens, and the other modern-day merry pranksters of comedy are long gone and forgotten, Billy Wilder's 1959 classic Some Like It Hot will still be the funniest movie you'll ever see. And it will just get funnier the next time you watch it. Watch it.

Time for Science!

     Well, as if the weather this week wasn't enough, these tell-tale flower buds prove it: Spring on her way. I love the Winter, but these first warm days are always welcome and seem brimming with energy. Of course, it's still February and there's still plenty of time for more cold weather and freezes and snow, but it's that glimpse of what's to come that gets me going. And of course, with this relatively waveless Winter, any change is welcome.
     Driving out towards Philly, I have seen a surf shop on Rt. 70 East, but have never stopped there for one reason or another. I think it's because I usually have some place that I'm going to with time constraints, and most times it's too late. Well, I finally got to go to Sunrise Surf Shop in Cherry Hill last weekend, and I was really impressed. I was surprised to find that a shop in Cherry Hill had more interesting boards, both new and used, than many of the shops on the Island. In fact, there's one in the used ranks that I see as a Charlie Brown's Christmas Tree sort of board - one that with a little love and some work could be a pretty cool board. It may join my ranks of boards that never get surfed because we never get waves any more (although, I did get out yesterday after work, which was fun, but I am yearning for some size). Anyway, check out that surf shop when you are out that way.

     We were cleaning out my Dad's storage garage and I found two gradeschool displays from bygone Science fairs. This one was pretty interesting. We built a wave-pool, with one side made of plexiglass so you could see the wave break, complete with a little clay surfer standing on the shoreline, timing the sets. We still have the wave-pool in my parents' attic.

     And this is the other one, and perhaps even more interesting. To determine the learning abilities of earthworms, I built a T-shaped maze, in which the worm was released in the bottom of the T, then came to a crossroads where it had to choose. One way led to a bare electrical wire stretched across the path, the other was safe.

     Well, turns out that worms do not cooperate with science too well:

   

This came on my shuffled iPod yesterday. It's been a while since I listened to this album, and I liked this song, so here it is. 

Recent Developments

 

 Henry, your hips!

     I listened to the Smashing Pumpkins epic tome to all the varied human emotions, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, the other day for the first time in a while, and it, like all great albums, still holds up from beginning to end. "Tonight, Tonight" may be an obvious selection from this album, but it's an incredible song, and the video is amazing.

    And the original film that was the inspiration for the aforementioned SP video, the George Méliès film A Trip to the Moon. Méliès was one of the first directors to bring storylines and elaborate sets to film. Enjoy!

Retrofit.

     Well, with the rain-day off from work today (seems like we've had a rainy weekday at least once a week every week this year), I decided to clean up the shop a bit, and while doing that, I decided to install two more boxes in my Simmons and try it out as a quad. And, judging by the surf forecasts, it's looking like I might not have to wait too long to test it.

     There's SF 004 in the back there, healing from some ding repairs and very lonesome. Someday, 004, someday. On the mini-Simmons, put the trailing edge of the front fins up 10 1/4 I think, with 1/4" toe. I'm hoping it works well, at least until I get some more keels for the board.

     I found this Clairtone Stereo Cabinet while walking Henry before work yesterday, so I quickly grabbed it, thus saving it from rain and/or the junkyard. It has a tube-powered Clairtone amplifier/receiver in it, and I tested the tubes; they all work, just two have a faint gas leak, nothing major. The AM/FM on said receiver does not work as of now, but it's just the dials that are messed up I think, because you can hear the a faint station and static. It also has a Garrard Laboratory Series Type A turntable, which, I am happy to say, DOES work, and sounds pretty good.

    It blows my mind to think that someone would throw something like this away. "Hey, Trashman, here's a relic from the past. Nope, they don't make them like this anymore. Yes, it's in good shape and works but I don't want it, please smash it to pieces in your truck." Unbelievable. What blows my mind is that this was found on one little side street in Tuckerton, NJ. Just think what kind of stuff gets thrown out everyday the World over? I can't think about it...

It even had the manuals.

    To test out the record player, I grabbed this record from the stack in my living room. Herbie Mann Live at the Village Gate,  recorded November of 1961. I hadn't listened to it in a while, and after listening to it now, I don't know why. This song, "Comin' Home Baby," is the first of two songs on side A, and it's really, really good. The whole album is actually. Check it out.