More with Pet and Cousin Brucie on PBS

[flv:http://www.dograt.com/Video/MAR07/PetBruce.flv 400 242]

Here’s another slice and splice with Petula Clark and legendary NY DJ Cousin Bruce Morrow from the PBS special My Music: The British Beat. I don’t actually agree with Pet’s comment that the Beatles were her big break in America. Her success was her own, of course, but if anybody deserves some credit for paving the way for Petula it was Julie Andrews, who had been in America for nearly ten years by that point. And before the Beatles the James Bond movies were hugely influential in opening up the U.S. to all things British.

Audio Fidelity Stereo Spectacular

Stereo Spectacular

The year was 1963. My father bought a big table-top GE stereo with an AM/FM radio and a swing-down record player. Something that came with the stereo was a demonstration record.

I enjoyed the first side of the record a lot, and I listened to it many times. I liked the way that one audio sample or snippet of music flowed into the next. The frequency sweep was something I used ten years later to test a stereo system I bought for myself with money earned washing dishes at a restaurant.

Also included on the record were a few so-called Cartoons in Stereo, that I think are still pretty funny. Side B was mostly a sampler of jazz music, but there were also a couple audio cartoons that were parodies of then-current TV commercials. The audio player below has the 20 minutes of side A, and the gags from side B.

[audio:https://s3.amazonaws.com/dogratcom/Audio/2012/08/StereoDemo.mp3|titles=Audio Fidelity Records Stereo Spectacular]