homepage Forums Air Combat & Civil Aviation Battle of Britain + Battle of Britain II Here's what happened (Continued)

Folks,

I'm safely back and no worse for wear. I enjoyed it. In fact I listened to it 10 times. Two of which I actually had the sound on.

MG:

That was another good and complementary cover of "Apache" and it was a somewhat different arrangement of same. This is one performance however that is definitely enhanced by the accompanying video.

The slightly demented, bouncing and buck-skinned Tommy Seebach seems to be reenacting Custer's last stand with the loveliest bunch of Indians any Seventh Cavalry grunt worth his boots could ever hope to be attacked by. This was one time I was more concerned about the quality of the video which was rather pixelated rather than the recorded sound which was good.

Thank you for sharing that. Shades of ET. I am becoming more and more amazed at how music seems to be the common language of the world, perhaps even the universe.

Folks,

Does it seem to you that these pages are turning rather faster than usual without even a graphic on them to take up space? I'm trying to pick out the pattern.

Don't miss my previous posts on page 712. OK, according to HWH regulation 2,345 sub section 6, column B, sub paragraph .002; I now have to type the following disclaimer:

Disclaimer:
Be advised that you will not actually miss much if you ignore my posts on page 712.

Ah, the old days, before the arrival of the Beatles, when the ultimate in teen fashion was to look like
a "hood", sort of a punk cross between Elvis and an italian gangster. Hair slicked with a ducktail at the back,
and an impossible aerodynamic swoosh at the front that extended forward from one side of the head, with social
status incrementing in correspondence with how far it could go straight out before sweeping around and back on the
other side. Pin striped white shirt with a snap across the narrow collar, insanely tight pants in either white or
black only, ending at mid ankle exposing black socks above pointy cuban heeled dress shoes, the ultimate being
brown Ritchie Romanos, the message being I'm so tough I don't need to wear black shoes to be cool. The
Romanos (I think they were Ritchie Co. of New York, so this may have been a continent wide phenomenon, but I have
no idea - prior to the Beatles, teen fashion garnered no comment whatsoever from the adult press (this was of
course before the word "media" was in use)) were a wildly extreme exaggeration of a very conservative shoe style,
with insanely long pointed toe caps with a tooled border, an austere lace front, and a matching tooled-border heel
piece above a 1.5 -2 or so inch heel. These were also very expensive and you had to have lots of cash to invest in
fashion, a further demonstration of disregard for accepted values. Further enhanced by the tradition of only
polishing the toe and heel caps, using black shoe polish to get a strange purply lustre, emphasizing the point,
while the rest of the upper cracked and scuffed. Oh, yes, and the cuban heels required horseshoe blakeys, so that
the right message of insolence could always be broadcast in clicks as one sauntered down the highschool hallways,
typically on the way to the principal's office to answer some charge of delinquency. I think it was my father who
commented "only good for kicking the eyes out of snakes". Proof that everything exists on the web, here's a link
to a page that shows something close to what I describe (disturbingly, it seems to be a fetishist page)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/37373140@N04/3507658289/in/set-72157618623920674/ except that this shoe is but a
faint echo of the swaggering excess of a real Ritchie Romano.

...Never heard the "winkle picker" term at the time, but learned of it later. As far as I can remember, they were
just called "points", as in the Bob Seger lyric "Tight pants, points all around".

Alas, or perhaps thankfully, the fashion had mostly fallen away by the time I was old enough to contemplate
participating. I rather chose to be in the vanguard rather than the rearguard, and so invested research into the
emerging mod style of the british invasion, with "pixie boots" - a sort of half-height beatle boot - quickly
superceded by square toed mod shoes; and the deeper mysteries of "high gear" and "low gear" and shirts with
giant collars which concealed a substantial fraction of chin, as well as neck...

Folks.

Dux:

Salubrious greeting received from you and while I could still focus on the screen tonight. Thank you for thinking of us and a Happy New Year to one and all.

PV1:

What a shock that must have been for the aged, printed scarf wearing, blue haired crowd lined up in the bus queue. Over here in the 50's kids had ducktail haircuts, pinstriped, button down collared shirts, ribbon thin belts certainly not needed to hold up their skin tight black pants with pegged legs above white socks and black penny loafers. And that was just the girls.....

Teens can be completely dependent and yet, at the same time, such a demonstrably rebellious crowd.

Chaps,

JRT,

I struggled with the wording presentaion on the e-card. The positioning didn't come out right, I'm afraid.

BTW: Check out the 'Shads' Man of Mystery for that stinging Stratocaster treble. Jet fluffs his bass line a bit at the end but this was in the days of one-take and they would have been against the studio clock. No dubbing over - it had to be done in one go. Also, if anybody thinks that the lads couldn't get it down, check out Scotch on the Socks on Spotify. There doesn't seem to be a decent version on Youtube.

Jens,

If Indian maidens had looked anything like that, there would have been a much swifter departure from the 'Old World'. Those guys have the seventies written all over them!

PV1,

You have revealed yourself as a real style guru. I had no idea!

Gentlermen,

4 degrees centigrade and clear blue skies so I just have to burst into:

Jens,

What a jolly tune that is. Must have heard it many, many times as a lad.

Can you imagine the BoB pilots sitting around at readiness with this song coming out from a battered radio with cigarette burns and teacup marks on it?

JRT,

RE; page 712:

You ended your post with a hearty 'Geronimo!' The Shadows released an instrumental with that very title...

Folks,

Dux:

I doubt it was the same version of "The Big Hurt" for that came out in the late 50's and by then you surely had been driving the family horse and cart and playing music on your battered old Gene Autry brand acoustic guitar (the one with that little red crank handle on the side to make the music play)for decades per the "old" in Old Dux. Am I right? The fact is during my search I discovered just how many and how often songs were re-issued, rearranged and or covered by different artists.

Indeed, the process of laying down individual tracks sometimes with artists playing their parts in different cities, the artful synthesizing and mixing and re-mixing, dubbing and re-dubbing is quite different from what recording was like back then. Different in fact from what even the Beatles enjoyed. Check out one of those videos of a Beatles recording sessions.

An accomplished recording artist like Bing or Sinatra just showed up at Capitol or RCA on time, stepped up to a pop filter shielding one of those big old studio mikes and belted out a song beginning to end. What you played or sang was just what you got. Woe be it to the scale-paid sideman who flubbed a note. You could start over or just carry on and muddle through. Still, listening to some of those old 78s and even later produced Motown 45s one is amazed at what the artists and technicians of the various and sometimes obscure labels could cut into those grooves on the "wax" of the day.

I have a stack of aging 78's, big hole in the middle 45s and more modern LPs that I plan to digitize one fine day. I have more technology here on this aging computer for removing snaps, scratches, pops and skips than they had during the 40's and 50's, maybe even the 60's. The only thing holding me back is a terminal case of apathy and a faulty Garrard turn table. I need to sort that out. The turn table that is, I am rather indifferent about the apathy.

I have typed many times on this thread that mostly today I listen to what people would call "classical" music broadcast over the air and online at www.theclassicalstation.org And this is perfectly true but now and again, as it has been for several days now, I dig into my storehouse of digitally mastered nostalgic old tunes dating from my teenage and young adult years and I just daydream of the days when air was clean and sex was considered dirty and not the other way 'round as it is today. A simpler, slightly more carefree time when a driver's license, a shiny, fast car with a good radio and a lovely date (not precisely in that order of importance) were more than enough to make me smile all over and be mighty happy. Sigh.....

Folks,

Dux:

Ooops. I misread. You were referring to "The Sun Has Got His Hat On" not TBH. Sorry 'bout that. I had never heard that particularly lively tune until we started getting British TV shows here regularly, especially the comedies. I think one of the characters in "Keeping Up Appearances", Emmott, sings it to or perhaps at Hyacinth.

Some may remember that in early days when BoB was new I had my own personalized Spitfire mod with an Indian chief emblazoned on her nose, and that ship was called "Geronimo".

I seem to recall that title. No doubt the copycat Ventures also recorded it.

Folks,

If anyone is interested in doing some home recording I recommend the following free or inexpensive options:

Audacity- Open Source, free and easy to use with lots of features and plugins

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

Reaper- Not free or especially intuitive but with a huge number of features and plugins. Updated almost weekly. My favorite at the moment.

Note: The older versions seem to be free.

http://www.reaper.fm/

Folks,

This is ridiculous. I have never seen pages turn this fast even in the hey days of SNAFU's thread. Whats up with that?

Better view the previous page for a possible trigger. Maybe it is just activated by a certain number of posts? That would not seem to be the case here. Maybe it is just random? Maybe MG or other admin. secreted in the shadows has a little red button he can push and he is having a little fun with us?

Folks,

Dux:

Did you receive a rather large 4 MB file titled "Dux and N Harrier"? If not, I can possibly re-send. If you did get it then I'm afraid I cannot take it back. ;(

JRT,

I have indeed received the Northern Harrier pic and it will be sent to my birding mates shortly. Many thanks old pal. They can then eat their hearts out while realizing my birding talents have been immortalized in indestructible oils! Muhahahaha.....poor saps!

Arize, Sir Dux, - if your head is still firmly attached to your shoulders and sorry about that small cut on your neck!

Congrats on your anniversary and if I may say so, you still look not a day older!


Gentlemen, if the pages turn faster at present it is perhaps because of the inclusion of popular culture, as in evidence by the choice selections for musical diversity we have been discussing lately, TBH seems to be a slow grower as apparently it took some 50 years to grow on Roger - or did I misinterpret something there my dear friend? - and an as yet unkown and undisclosed fact that the HWH could posibly be about to enter the mysterious friefdom and hallowed halls of cult status. I can say no more, but trust and hope that all will be revealed in due course.

From the musical discussion here I have had an exellent opportunity to revisit some of my national musical heritage and found very little of interest.



However, this is clearly inspired by the Shadows, and will probably stay in your head for oh I don't know, 40 minutes? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4QBYw7FFj4

40 years more likely.

Thanks McG! Don't worry about that life threatening laceration which narrowly missed my jugular vein. I will blame it on my local hairdresser. His haircuts always remind me of that famous John Buchan novel: The Thirty-nine Steps.

The good old Rocking Ghosts, bless 'em. How well that golden age of the female figure is celebrated - if only in cartoon form. Too many of today's young ladies look like candidates for the Michelin Woman.

Folks,

Thanks to this noble experiment created on 4/24/01 at 2:01 PM by our revered HWH founder, SNAFU, we have assembled here almost daily over the past decade(it will be a full decade in a few months)with nary a cross word or the slightest singe to anyone's ego or pride due to even one thoughtless, self-indulgent flame that I am aware of. Thank you for that SNAFU, AKA: Mark Carroll.

Congratulations and thank you too my long time mate Dux for sticking with me even when our Fearless Founder disappeared into the swirling digital mists over the Channel never to be heard from again.

I do not know precisely what the date of my first post was but I do know that I was the seventh poster right after Bader. The first poster right after SNAFU was an Aussie from Perth, Tiger27. I wonder where he is?

Here is the list of the first ten:

After 04/24/01 the first ten posters on this thread were, and in order(not counting SNAFU):
Tiger27, Perth, W. Aust.
Nealg, Tracy, CA, USA
Scouser, New South Wales, Aust.
JagNeun, Winchester, Va, USA
Bader, Redhill, Surrey, UK
Jolly Roger Too, Rocky Mount, NC, USA
Arch, Yorkshire, UK
Zakalwe, Eckemfoerde, Germany
Ajax, Montreal, QC
Flying Fish, (Forward Deployed?)

Not all posted stories at that time however they were the first ten to post on the new thread.

I suppose it is a wise man that manages to heap many important dates into one week. If so, you are wise indeed; for unless my memory fails me you will thumb your ample nose at the Reaper once more and joyously join with friends and loved ones to celebrate yet another birthday on Friday. Then on Saturday we will all get together for a virtual celebration of the first time you landed your Spit in Farmer Drubbibn's pig sty entirely sober. I hope someone remembered to alert all the distilleries in the UK so they could put on at least one extra shift last week.

C51 has a wedding anniversary coming up on Tuesday. Fortunately the festivities for that will, as far as I know, be held entirely within the boundaries of Canada. Otherwise the availability of my own favorite beverages might be in serious jeopardy.

I'm pleased that you like 'Dux and Harrier'. If not, all I can say in a public venue such as this is "tough cheese!" That will have to serve as tenth HWH anniversary and birthday gift as well so you can jolly well make the best of it. Frankly, and not to put too fine a point on it, I would have done the same thing for someone I actually like.

MG:

That is a very pregnant hint my friend. But what could that mean? I've been scratching me old head too much already mate. Now my scratches will have scratches until I find out the meaning.

I'm on my way to that recommended happy hunting ground site. Are the Indians still on the warpath? This time I'm better prepared for I've cleaned my glasses and I'm wearing a feather headdress of finest synthetic chicken feathers....but very little else........

Folks,

MG:

OK, I'm back un-scalped and with nary an arrow poking out of any orifice, natural or otherwise. Was I ever embarrassed, no love thirsty Indian maidens either. The song from the 60's was a toe tapper and the accompanying graphics were most attractive. What do you think Dux? The cartoon style to me was reminiscent of our Archie Comics without quite so much cleavage.

You may not be familiar with Archie, Jughead, Betty and Veronica. If not, trust me, the art is very similar. Always remember, you can usually trust you better judgment, you can trust your wife most of the time but you can always trust me.

I heard that grumbling remark and I'm hurt to the very core. Remember when I borrowed that fiver and I told you MG would pay you back? Well it was MG and not me that let you down, right? And that time I sold you a round trip ticket for two on the Concorde for just 3 quid. I bet you remember that. It wasn't my fault it would be 30 years before it was built. Yes, you can always and invariably count on two things... your fingers and moi.

JRT

I do indeed remember the Archie comics and the post-war American comics. They were seen as prized possessions in those austerity years. Those girlie cartoons in McG's post were identical to the style that used to be seen in the Playboy type mags etc., er....so I am told.