Dumpster Vinyl Volume 16: July 4th “Safety” Public Service from “The Big Sound” series PS-4-R

Last week was pleas for volunteers for the Red Cross; this week the National Safety Council is here to tell you how to be safe on July 4th.

Nah, just kidding, they’re mostly here to scare you into driving safely (and not drinking while doing it) so that you don’t end up “a statistic”.  I never understood that turn of phrase.  For every recorded statistic, there is its silent statistical counterpart.  Oh, X% of fatal accidents on July 4th involved at least one drinking driver? Then that means that 100-X% of fatal accidents didn’t. And then some Y percent of drivers didn’t have accidents at all.  And then some Z percent of Americans celebrate at home on the 4th.  There is absolutely no way to not be a statistic.  Wouldn’t it be simpler to just say “don’t end up a dead guy”?

P.S. Don’t miss Jack Lemmon’s delightful little limerick about a kid losing an eye.

P.P.S. Very disappointed that Stan Freberg’s track about not drinking and driving did not include sound effects. Missed opportunity there, Stan.

 

Dumpster Vinyl Volume 7: “Stay in School” Public Service

Looks like it might be public service announcements for awhile.  This week, we’re dispensing with the spectre of Mother Russia and her many bombs, but we are keeping the “keep the populace in line” angle. That’s right, everybody, Boris Karloff is here to tell those teens to stay in school!

Last week reminded me of Hawkwind “Sonic Attack”; this week’s entry reminds me of the Firesign Theatre.  Namely, their third album, “Don’t Crush that Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers”, one of the major story arcs of which was the 1940s/50s teenage movie featuring Porgie and Mudhead.  I’ve loved the Firesign Theatre for years even with only a glancing, rudimentary knowledge of the media they were spoofing. But every now and then I turn up the types of source material they grew up on and I appreciate them just a little bit more.  Principal Poop’s messages to the students of Morse Science High have definite echoes of the verbiage utilized on this disc.

And this disc gets us one step closer to dating the “Big Sound” series, because Bob Denver’s on here, doing penance for corrupting the youth of America with his stint as Maynard G. Krebs on The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, which ran from 1959 to 1963.  Gilligan’s Island started in September of 1964.  So I’m going to put this series of programming elements at early 1964 at the absolute latest.  Sure, there’s an LP auction aggregator website listing discs from this series as being from 1963, but I am a librarian and I know that media objects are the primary source of information about themselves.  So I’m going to just say that we’ve narrowed our range for The Big Sound to 1960-1964.  That’s pretty good for only 6 discs in and being too lazy to triangulate the careers of all these celebrities!

And if any of you goddam teens are reading this, STAY THE FUCK IN SCHOOL, YOU LITTLE SHITS.