Sunday Showcase May 31, 1981

Lawrence Welk, Donald Duck, and Andrea McArdle dressed as Dorothy walk into a bar...

...and you get the cover of this week's Sunday Showcase review. I had a big crush on Andrea McArdle when I was few years younger after seeing her on the Tony Awards or something. I don't understand why a television movie from 1978 is getting such a push in 1981, but seeing her wearing ruby slippers is cool. I did watch Rainbow when it aired the first time as I also adored Judy Garland when I was a child. 

Andrea McArdle sings Stormy Weather

April Wine were coming to play the Tennessee Theater on June 16. They are not mentioned in the ad, but Franke and the Knockouts were the opening act. "Just Between You And Me" was a bit smash for April Wine at this time and "Sweetheart" was a top ten hit for Franke and the Knockouts too in the spring of 1981. I like April Wine's hard rock material and I love that they (like their fellow Canadians Rush) shot a music video at the now gone Le Studio.

April Wine "I Like To Rock" shot at Le Studio

"Just Between You And Me" live in 1982

Franke and the Knockouts on American Bandstand

Tunesmith Jesse Winchester would play the Tennessee Theater a few days after April Wine. He was out promoting his Talk Memphis album so I'll include "Say What" which made it into the Top 40 in June of 1981. 

"Say What"

Last week's Sunday Showcase review ended with ZZ Top's 1976 World Wide Texas Tour and here they are back again in 1981 along with Loverboy. I think they left the wild animals in Texas this time.  ZZ Top were touring after releasing the Devo inspired album El Loco. You think I'm joking, but the use of synthesizers on the record, in particular on "Groovy Little Hippie Pad" was inspired by Gibbons seeing a soundcheck by Devo. I couldn't find any good 1981 live footage, but I did find a good version of "Groovy Little Hippie Pad" from 1982 and you really can hear the Devo coming through which is fascinating.  Loverboy would be headliners the next time they played Nashville. 

"Groovy Little Hippie Pad" live in 1982

There was a big new attraction at Opryland opening. The Grizzly River Rampage with its rough and tumble white water rafting was all set with Grizzly Adams himself,  Dan Haggerty, coming to town for the occasion. I've probably written this before and I'll write it again, but I have never set foot inside Opry Malls and never will. I despise those money hungry jerks at Gaylord that leveled one of the happiest places on the planet. I rode the Grizzly River Rampage often over the years and loved getting wet if the weather was really hot and humid. I would have loved to have gotten season passes for my family of 5, but it wasn't to be. 

Rock 106 was the best hard rock FM station in Nashville until the station was sold and the format was changed to easy listening junk. There was a legacy left however with the Homegrown compilation album. I've got it in my collection. 

8th grade had just ended for me or perhaps it was still going for a week or so as I remember watching the Thurman Francis Junior High tumbling team do a routine set to the Stars on 45 "Medley" during the last week of school. "Morning Train" had been a favorite of my girlfriend Lisa that spring. I bought the Styx album after finding $40 on the ground. I also bought Pony tennis shoes and went to a carnival on that windfall. Kim Carnes's "Bette Davis Eyes" was a monster that year. 

I've heard it all before

Sheena

I'm a jet fueled genius

her hair is Harlow gold

Even though it wasn't in the Sunday Showcase here is some bonus Rush from Le Studio. 

"Tom Sawyer" from Le Studio

"Limelight" from Le Studio

Film Flashback May 29, 1975

If you were in the mood for a trio of biker films back on May 29, 1975 then Murfreesboro, Tennessee would have been the place to be. The Marbro Drive-In has Angels Die Hard, Bury Me An Angel, and Angels Hard As They Come on the marquee. I'm not going into the summaries of these movies. They are biker flicks. There's leather and violence, but most of all there's motorcycles. Bury Me An Angel is interesting since it is told from the woman's perspective and Jonathan Demme co-wrote and produced Angels Hard As They Come.

Angels Die Hard trailer

Bury Me Angel trailer

Angels Hard As They Come opening credits

The Martin Twin in Jackson Heights Plaza has a couple of oddball entries this day. Death Race 2000 would become a drive in staple after its run in regular movie houses. It's a Roger Corman produced dystopian vision of a world in which the greatest sport is running people over and its greatest champion is named Frankenstein. The movie is ridiculous, over the top, and lots of fun if you like bleak humor. Sylvester Stallone is part of the cast with the very cool Mary Woronov and star David Carradine. 

Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins stars Alan Arkin, Sally Kellerman, Mackenzie Phillips, Charles Martin Smith, and Harry Dean Stanton among others. Arkin plays driving instructor Rafferty with Kellerman and Mackenzie playing the Gold Dust Twins McKinley and Frisbee who kidnap him. He goes rather willingly with them to New Orleans. It's a quirky counter culture road trip film very much of the era. I saw it on TCM a few years back and thought it was okay. 

Death Race 2000 trailer

Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins trailer

Young Frankenstein is playing at the Cinema One. It would play at Cinema One, Martin Twin, and the Marbro Drive In at various times over the years. This was a huge hit for Mel Brooks. Gene Wilder is dynamite - I love Teri Garr "roll in the hay" - Madeline Kahn is divine - Marty Feldman makes a great Igor - Cloris Leachman is frightening - but the big star is the monster played by Peter Boyle. It's such a well crafted comedy with an obvious love of the original Frankenstein movies that you can watch it over and over again and find something new to love each time. Murfreesboro definitely loved it.

Young Frankenstein trailer

Tuesday Tunes

It's Tuesday. Here's some tunes. Several by Redd Kross. I really like them. I've been listening to all of these tunes the last few weeks.

do it now don't hesitate

it's show time

put a stack of records on the stereo

we listen to the Knack

get me some of those rays

not quite right

I hate when stupid things ruin a perfect day

I wanna feel the sun rays

she's going nowhere

Memorial Day 2020

Take a moment to reflect. 

Sunday Showcase May 23, 1976

I'm off to visit 1976 this time around.

Our journey this day is into the Bicentennial year where a former star of Your Hit Parade graces the cover of the Sunday Showcase. I had not heard of Snooky Lanson before reading this issue as Your Hit Parade's heyday was long before I was born, but he had a lengthy and successful career in entertainment including being a pitchman for Crown Ford.

Snooky with a jazzy take on Heartbreak Hotel

100 Oaks Shopping Center (yes, that's right - it was not called a mall officially during this point in time, but the ad does state "all this week in the Mall" which is strange) is saluting radio all week. All of the big Nashville stations were participating with remote broadcasts and live performances. 

100 Oaks Office Tower promo film which shows the shopping center

The mid-Seventies was the peak for customizing vans and here's a cool advertisement from Middle Tennessee's largest showroom and inventory of custom van parts: C & S Custom Vans. 

If you really wanted to kit the floor of your van out you might want some shag carpeting or perhaps you need it for your whole house. Shag carpet was another culture marker which peaked in the Seventies. I think the carpet makers and vacuum cleaner companies were all in on it together. 

We continue on with the fads of the Seventies with the ultra popular Earth Shoe which could be picked up at Green Hills Village Shopping Center/Lower Mall. Remember, just because a shoe looks like the Earth shoe doesn't mean it works like the Earth shoe.

After I've kitted out my custom van and bought some new Earth shoes I might head over to the Women's Building at the Fairgrounds and check out the Mysterious Rhinestone Cowboy David Allen Coe in concert on May 29th. I met David Allen Coe once. He was a very tall, large man.

The Top 10 Records in Nashville for this week are once again that great hodgepodge of Seventies music with all kinds of styles to choose from. Radio and society in general had yet to be demographic-ed and segmented to death. I loved "Boogie Fever" as a 9 year old kid and still love it today. Paul McCartney & Wings are on the local chart for the 2nd week with "Silly Love Songs" which went on to be the best selling single of the year in the US. Two television themes are in the top 10 with Happy Days and Welcome Back, Kotter represented. I loved both of those shows. 

Pratt & McClain 

Welcome Back to that same old place you laughed about

Silly

Sylvers on The Midnight Special

You could boogie all night at Tuff Rocks Disco located in Tusculum Square. There were only 2 ads for it when I did a general search so I don't know if it lasted long. I like the ad and name of the disco. I assume Troy Shondell was the vocalist who had put out some records for Liberty and Sunset Records among others.

Perhaps commercial pop radio and disco wasn't your bag. KDA-FM was bringing progressive rock giants Yes to Municipal Auditorium on June 1. 

Yes live in Nashville June 1, 1976

We end the Sunday Showcase review this week by planning to get the heck out of Nashville and head to Atlanta to see ZZ Top's World Wide Texas Tour. This was the tour where they brought the livestock. I guess if you were going to fill a baseball stadium in the Seventies you needed to go big on your promotional material as this full page ad attests. I bet quite a few people from Nashville made the drive down on that day.

ZZ Top live in Maryland November 1976

World Wide Texas Tour report

Film Flashback May 22, 1976

May 22, 1976 was a Saturday night in Murfreesboro, Tennessee so what better time to go see a movie. You could see a matinee (well, not on a Saturday at the Cinema One), then hop over and see the first showing at another theatre, and still have time to see the late movie even. It's a Burt Reynolds bonanza on this night with your choice of Gator at the Cinema One or The Longest Yard at the Marbro Drive In. Before we go to the movies how about visiting Shoney's since they have a strawberry carnival going on.

Gator is ostensibly the sequel to White Lightning, but it feels more like a reboot to me. Burt plays Gator McKlusky who is back to making moonshine so the Feds pinch him to help in bringing the evil Bama McCall (played superbly by Jerry Reed) down. Lauren Hutton plays Burt's love interest while Jack Weston is the federal agent. There is an awesome boat chase at the beginning of the film and lots of other crazy stunts including one that almost got Hal Needham killed. The movie is really great at times, but it seems to swing wildly in tone like it can't figure out if it's an action drama or action comedy. I do like it enough to own the blu-ray. I didn't get to see it in the theatre, but remember catching it every time it aired on network television. It was the first film that Burt Reynolds directed.

We comin' to getcha Gator

Time to pay some bills here. I promised Frank I would run his Bicentennial ad for the money saving Save-A-Chips. Frank's IGA was one of my father's favorite grocery stores along with A & P which was later changed to Giant Foods, and Darwin's Shop-Rite. 

The Martin Twin has a couple of future drive-in movie staples with The Pom Pom Girls and the Roger Corman produced Eat My Dust. Eat My Dust would play the Marbro in November 1976, February 1977, and May 1978 while The Pom Pom Girls would play at the drive-in March 1979, January 1980, February and August 1981, and February 1982 paired with The Cheerleaders. I know such arcane information since I am compiling a list of every film that played Marbro Drive-In which I plan on sharing here beginning in July. Both films may have played additional times, but I'm just up to March 1982 and still have a few years to go. But for now the movies get their first run at Jackson Heights Center.

The Pom Pom Girls is your typical teen sex comedy of the era with a preoccupation with cheerleaders, football, and R rated hijinks. The movie would actually be re-released later with the nudity removed so the film could get a PG rating. The movie has future Revenge Of The Nerds star Robert Carradine in his first lead role. I've never seen this movie, but I do have this DVD set with it on it so I guess I need to give it a chance. I dig the Seventies cars and fashions in the trailer.

Their last chance to raise hell

Let's pause for another commercial. This time it is for the anchor store at Memorial Village: the great and wonderful Big K which was my second favorite department store in Murfreesboro.

Ron Howard wanted to get into directing so Roger Corman said sure, I'll let you direct a movie for me as long as you star in Eat My Dust first. So Ron starred in this great car chase film in order to direct and star in another car chase film called Grand Theft Auto the next year. Eat My Dust is about a high school kid stealing a stock car to impress a girl who ends up with riding with him. Many of the film's chase scenes were incorporated into the very similarly plotted Smokey Bites The Dust in 1981. This is a movie I really enjoy with great car chase footage and a certain wistful quality later during a time when the car is hidden away.  It was often matched with Gone In 60 Seconds during its drive-in run.

Ron Howard pops the clutch and tells the world to eat my dust

The Marbro Drive-In has a couple of superstar movies with Diana Ross starring in Mahogany while Burt Reynolds is onscreen for almost every scene in another of my favorite films The Longest Yard which was featured in the January 10, 1975 Film Flashback. You can click that link if you want to hear about that one. As for Mahogany I have never seen this movie, but I like Diana Ross and Billy Dee Williams is super cool so I may have to check it out. The movie also features Anthony Perkins and Bruce Vilanch is in it too. If you are unfamiliar with the movie I'm sure you know the massive hit tune from it. The "Theme From Mahogany (Do You Know Where You're Going To)" performed by Diana Ross garnered an Academy Award nomination for best song and hit number one on the Hot 100 Billboard charts. 

Diana Ross not only sings, she is a fashion designer

Do you know where you are goin to....well do you?

I think I broke his @*$&!^G neck!

Sunday Showcase May 20, 1973

It was Emmy time with Johnny Carson hosting on May 20, 1973. CBS would win the most awards on the night taking 17, ABC gets 11, PBS with 6, and NBC bringing up the rear with just 5 awards. All In The Family and The Waltons are among the series that won an Emmy that night. You can find a complete list at Wikipedia.

I love this headline about ABC sportscasting legend Howard Cosell. I always enjoyed Howard's ponderous way behind the microphone, plus he was later the host of The Battle Of The Network Stars so I can never forget that.

Sound Seventy was bringing Jethro Tull to Municipal Auditorium on May 21 so if you were in the mood for some flute in your rock and roll that would be the place to be on Monday night. If you wanted your flute with a bit softer and less progressive bent you could skip this one and wait to see Lawrence Welk presented by WSIX-TV 8. There was bound to be some flute music to go with the champagne.

Hermitage Landing took out a full page ad in this Sunday Showcase. I would get to go there in the late Seventies and then catch the One For The Sun concert there in 1984.

KDA-FM & Woodland Sound Studio were presenting the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band live on the air that Sunday night. Years later my folks were looking for a new place to rent and we toured a house that had a small upstairs bedroom which featured a poster of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band left by the former tenants. We didn't move into this house, but that room with the poster still figures in my memories. I like to think all of our lives are filled with such ephemera, but perhaps not. 

Once again The Villa features a band posing with a train. If there are any train buffs that recognize the train or know anything about Carnival let me know in the comments.

Boston band Orphan was coming to play a few days at Exit-In. The Showcase mentions they have country overtones and I'd have to agree.

If you were a businessman working downtown you could get your lunch at the world famous Red Lion Lounge. I think 6 hours of continuous Go-Go and exotic entertainment would be a bit much.

The Eagles were still at the small theater stage of their career, but wouldn't be for long. They were playing War Memorial Auditorium on June 3 with the always great Charlie Daniels  opening for them. My opinion of The Eagles waxes and wanes, but it is interesting to me that there was a time when The Eagles were considered a cult band. 

My opinion of Elvis Presley however never changes. He was and always will be the King of Rock and Roll for me. My mother was from North Mississippi just a few counties over from Tupelo and she moved to Memphis in the Fifties. Elvis was her favorite musical artist much to my father's consternation. Elvis was coming later in the summer to Municipal and the shows were already sold out. 

All that's left for this week's Sunday Showcase review is the Top 10 Records list and its a fairly wide range of styles which was very typical in the Seventies. There's some soul, some country, some hard rock, country, and an ex-Beatle all showing up this week. "Frankenstein" would be my favorite of this bunch, but Canadian group Skylark featuring future mega producer David Foster and the amazing vocal talents of Donny Gerrard is pretty awesome too. I learned something watching the "Frankenstein" live video or perhaps I knew it once and forgot it, but the song's title comes from how it was edited down with different pieces of tape comprising the final version.

Skylark

Edgar Winter Group live version of Frankenstein

Next week I'm going through a 1976 Sunday Showcase so be sure to wear some Bicentennial themed clothes.

Film Flashback May 15, 1979

Today's film flashback got eaten by zombies. My whole post full of movie summaries and pithy comments did not get saved. All of it gone in a split second. So instead of that glittering prize of a post you're going to have to settle for this one. May 15, 1979 was a Tuesday in Murfreesboro so that meant bargain seats at the Martin Twin.

Your choices on this spring night were Take Down and Dawn Of The Dead. If you wanted to see George A. Romero's Dawn Of The Dead you had to be at least 17 to get into it. It is the classic zombie tale set in the actual Monroeville Mall in Pennsylvania. The special effects are by Tom Savini and the music by Goblin. I didn't see it then since I was only 12, but I've seen it many times over the year and it never disappoints.

Take Down does boast the former and forever Marcia Brady, Maureen McCormick, so I am surprised I haven't seen it as I try to see anything with former Brady's in it. I couldn't find the trailer for it, but the whole film is on YouTube at this time so I'll put it in this post and see how long it lasts. The plot is about a snobbish teacher taking over the coaching duties of a wrestling team.

Norma Rae is playing over at Cinema One featuring an Academy Award winning performance from Sally Field. She plays a single mother who tries to unionize a textile factory. I've never seen it, but I do like Sally Field so I should take the time to view it one of these days. 

The other bargain choice for the night was on the north side of town at the Marbro Drive In. You never knew what you'd get there. Some nights it might be typical grindhouse fare, Academy Award winners, or children's films. On this night it was teenage comedy movies. Hometown U.S.A. is an American Graffiti homage (it wouldn't be nice to say ripoff) directed by Max Baer Jr. of The Beverly Hillbillies fame. It's about teenagers in the Fifties cruising around and had played at the Martin Twin just the week before. Cheering Section is about a high school football player wooing the coach's daughter. One reviewer at IMDB called it a "total waste of celluloid." I could not find trailers for either film so thus ends this film flashback. I'll be back next week with another of these posts if blogger doesn't eat it too. I don't think I could take another one gobbled up by ether net zombies. I will leave you with the Goblin "Dawn Of The Dead Theme" however and a giant ad that was in the May 11, 1979 DNJ.

GOBLIN

Sunday Showcase May 9, 1982

1982 we're looking at you! What do beauty pageants, Eleanor Roosevelt, Nazis, Aretha Franklin, and Rodney Dangerfield have in common? They're all featured on the front of the May 9, 1982 Sunday Showcase.

We didn't have any issues with pandemics in May of 1982 since we had David Banner (40 some odd years since the show premiered and it still sounds so wrong) and his alter ego the Incredible Hulk to take care of such things for us.

One thing I enjoy about researching the past is pinning down exactly what I was doing and where I was at in a place of time. As the cover notes the Miss USA pageant was going to be broadcast on Thursday at 8 p.m. on Channel 5. I may not recall watching it, but my mother watched all of the big network televised pageants so it was definitely on in our house. Something I know for certain that I watched was the network television premiere of Caddyshack which was airing May 9th. I missed out on seeing it in the theatre and somehow had not sneaked a look at it on cable television when we had lived in town. We were living out in the country on Jimmy C. Newman's farm by this point in time so even an edited Caddyshack was a big television treat for me. 

Sound Seventy Productions was still going strong in 1982 with a couple of big concerts coming to Nashville soon. Chicago was on the cusp of a huge comeback with the release of their Chicago 16 due to be released in June. "Hard To Say I'm Sorry" would be released on May 16th and would hit number 1 later on that year. The next time they played the middle Tennessee area it would be at Murphy Center instead of the much smaller capacity Grand Ole Opry House. 

One of the oddest bills would be the 38 Special concert. Point Blank makes sense, but having New Wave Of Heavy Metal artists Iron Maiden open at Municipal Auditorium seems insane to me. My musical tastes are very broad, but I doubt many of the 38 Special fans would have known what to think about Iron Maiden who were touring with new lead singer Bruce Dickinson to promote their The Number Of The Beast record which had been released in March. If you happened to be there on this night let me know in the comments. I bet it was wild.

Iron Maiden live in 1982

Capitol Records were pushing Iron Maiden along with perpetual money makers The Beatles and up and coming The Motels with specials on their music at local Sound Shops and The Turntable Record Shops. I bought Reel Music and The Number Of The Beast. I've always thought Reel Music ws trying to cash in on the Stars On 45 phenomenon. 

We know decades all get nice little categories assigned to them like the Seventies was the Me Decade or the 1920's was the Jazz Age or the Roaring 20's, but we also know that these times don't necessarily begin with clean cut precision. Many boomers (OK boomer) think the Sixties didn't die until Saigon fell. Well, for this Gen X kid, I'm saying the Eighties didn't begin until the Brooke Shields doll was released. You could have gotten one at Cain Sloan along with lots of cool Eighties style clothes to go with it. 

There's even a ring for you!

"Now wait a second! The Eighties didn't begin with a Brooke Shields doll. It began with me!" Well....who the heck are you? "Why I'm Pac-Man released by NAMCO in 1980. I am where the Eighties begins. Space Invaders was cool, but I'm the Alpha video game. I gobbled up multitudes of quarters and  inspired clothes, cereal, pop music tunes, advertising copy, and Saturday morning cartoons too. I even survived Atari putting out a terrible version of me." 

Ok, Pac-Man. You win. I think I'll go pick my Pac-man shirt up at Cain Sloan and then run over to Wendy's and see if I can win myself an Atari console through their Pac-Mania contest. 

10 minutes of Pac-Man related commercial from 1981-1986

Let's head back to the Nashville music scene which was going strong at Cantrell's. The punk/New Wave band hailing from the hippie commune The Farm was coming to play on Friday night. I used to see The Nuclear Regulatory Commission album pretty regularly back when record stores were allowed to be open. I might pick it up one of these days. 

NRC white sugar

The White Animals, who could usually be found playing Cantrell's, were at the Ringside Seat this week. I've been a massive fan of them since at least my junior year of high school.

White Animals I Need You So

If you were in the mood for some country and bluegrass you could venture out to Opryland and see Ricky Skaggs or Reba McEntire. Perhaps if you timed it right you could catch both of them. 

Ricky Skaggs Heartbroke in 1982

Reba McEntire from 1982

The Rodeway Inn Central featured Johnny Porrazo and lots and lots of drinks. You would not go thirsty there my friend. 

I have never heard of Fantasy House, but I would have loved to see what they had back in 1982. 

The Top Ten is full of classic tunes with Joan Jett & The Blackhearts dominating the chart. "I Love Rock N' Roll" was just huge and a complete change of pace for the pop music world really. It was so loud compared to anything else. I had that tune, the J. Geils Band Freeze Frame album, and the Go-Go's too. The Go-Go's pretty much rule!

Joan Jett don't forget the Blackhearts

Freeze-Frame

Go-Go's pretty sure I posted this just weeks ago, but hey it's the Go-Go's who rule!

That's all for this week. Come back next Sunday for another one of these forays into the past.