"And Jackie, have you ever seen a Victoria's Secret ad?"

"A lot of musicians have always been proud to have commercial affiliation. Sonny Boy Williamson sold flour. I can't imagine Sonny Boy saying, 'My blues is too sacred. I wouldn't sell flour.' Jimmie Rodgers sold biscuits. Sheryl Crow sells hair dye. More power to her.

"And Jackie, have you ever seen a Victoria's Secret ad?" - Bob Dylan, Theme Time Radio Hour, "Days of the Week" episode.

A couple of commercial affiliation notices.  First, a heart-felt thanks to the various messages of support - some from unexpected sources - we've received over the past few weeks.  It's much appreciated.  Dreamtime has weathered various storms over the years,  We'll weather this one too.

A number of our Great Britain and European reader/listeners asked if we could put up affiliate links to amazon.co.uk, since that's where they did their shopping rather tham amazon.com.  If you look over in the right column now, you'll find a link to Dreamtime amazon.co.uk as well as an amazon.co.uk. search box.  The deal is the same as with the U.S. amazon.  Start your visit to Amazon through Dreamtime, and if you make any purchases, we get a small piece of the action, at no additional cost to you. Can we make a living from it?   Nope.  Does it help offset our Jones for books and music?  Definitely yes.

You'll also see a new web widget at the top of the page, this one a promotion for Mr. D's forthcoming Together Through Life.  I'm still tinkering with it, but it currently has a live news feed about the album; a Twitter feed from DylanTweets; one of my ubiquitous countdown clocks; and a purchase link to amazon.com.  I'll be adding more stuff as bobdylan.com/Sony releases it.  You'll see a small "Share" button at the bottom right, or you can go to this link to see a list of various platforms you can embed the widget on.  So if you're into Facebook, iGoogle, MySpace, et al; feel free to grab the widget and use it on your own site.  That's what it's there for.

Hank Thompson - Whoa, Sailor

"I realized I'd never be able to play my style of music in Nashville. . . . They didn't allow any electric instruments. They didn't allow drums. They didn't allow horns. And where was I gonna work up there? Down in Texas I knew all these bars and honky-tonks where I could get work, because by then I was playing dance music." - Hank Thompson

We couldn't find Hank's Rockin' in the Congo as a video, so we pulled up this somewhat "Around the World"-related tune, Whoa, Sailor, instead.

The King of Honky-Tonk Swing, Hank Thompson had a sixty-year career singing about booze, babes, and generally raisin' hell. Over a twenty-year period, from 1948 to 1978, Thompson had 28 Top-10 hits. His backup band, the Brazos Valley Boys, was Billboard magazine's top-ranked Western swing band from 1953 to 1965.

As a high school student in the early 1940s, Thompson hosted a Waco radio show, billing himself as "Hank the Hired Hand." After his discharge from the Navy following WW II, Thompson returned to radio and had a regional hit in Texas with his recording of Whoa Sailor.

In 19 and 52, incidentally the year Your Host was born, Hank would have his first national #1 single, The Wild Side of Life, a song which contained the memorable line, "I didn't know God made honky-tonk angels." That sentiment would end up launching Kitty Wells career, who protested in a reply song, It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels, that cheatin' husbands were leading girls astray rather than the Good Lord.

Thompson hosted a television variety show in Oklahoma City from 1954 to 1957, which was the first music variety show to be broadcast in color. He was also the first country-western performer to record a live album in Vegas, Live at the Golden Nugget. He was, however, no fan of the Grand Ole Opry, as his quote that opens this article notes.

With a man whose repertoire included A Six-Pack to Go and Bubbles in My Beer it's no wonder that one of Hank Thompson's TV sponsors was Falstaff Beer, once one of the biggest-selling labels in the U.S., but gone where the wild goose goes in 2005. In our continuing "Commercial Affiliation" sub-theme, here's a video of Hank endorsing Falstaff.



Sources: Washington Post obituary; Wikipedia

Episode 49 - Blossom and Jack

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Overture - The Girl with the Baby Doll Voice

[Figure 8 - Blossom Dearie]

Blossom Dearie with the winsome Figure 8 from Schoolhouse Rock!. And to answer the second question that everyone asks, the story goes that she got her first name after her delighted brothers brought fresh pear blossoms into the house to celebrate her birth. "Dearie" is a family name originating in Scotland.

Born in upstate New York, Blossom Dearie began playing piano at an early age and studied classical music before switching over to jazz while in high school. She headed straight to New York City after graduating, playing at clubs both solo and with other performers, including the titian-haired Annie Ross, who would later go on to be the "Ross" of the Lambert, Hendricks, and Ross scat jazz group. Even though Blossom Dearie recorded her first album for Verve in 19 and 56, and had nearly a half-dozen years of performing under her belt by that time, she later said that she felt her professional career didn't really begin until the early 1960s when she began writing songs while working at a London jazz club and making regular guest appearances on the popular Not Only... But Also television show with Dudley Moore and Peter Cook.

Dearie is probably best remembered by jazz aficionados for her string of records for the Verve label in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and her regular appearances on the New York City cocktail club circuit. Dave Garroway, original host of the Today show, was a huge fan of Blossom Dearie's, featuring her on the morning show several times, which helped expand her audience past New York City and Europe.

John Lennon was another Blossom Dearie fan, and the feeling was mutual. Blossom would write a fan letter in song, 1970s Hey, John, after meeting Lennon on a television show.

And Blossom Dearie was no stranger to commercial affiliation either, which Our Host would likely approve. In 19 and 62, she recorded a radio commercial for Hires Root Beer, a song that proved so popular that the company commissioned Dearie to record a full LP, Blossom Dearie Sings Rootin' Songs. Hires offered the album as a mail-in premium that could be had for two bottle caps and 50 cents. Today, the original LP goes for hundreds of dollars on eBay - when you can find a copy - or as a pricey CD import from Japan.

In her later career, Blossom Dearie was a fixture at Danny’s Skylight Room, a back room lounge of a New York Theater District Thai restaurant that played unlikely host to many legendary jazz artists. She sang in that sweet baby-doll voice from the 1990s almost up until the Skylight Room's closing, a frail lady in her seventies, still winning over crowds and critics alike, garnering enough attention that several of her classic Verve albums were finally re-released on CD as the new century began. After her set, Blossom would sit in a corner booth, receiving fans, signing autographs and selling CDs from her own private label, Daffodil.

Now 80, Blossom Dearie seems to have finally retired, both professionally and from the world. Her web site and record label site are closed, and little information is available about her after 2006. She reportedly lives a quiet, private life in the Woodstock, New York area.

I like to think that you might go out to Woodstock on some winter's day and see a little old lady skating by herself on a frozen pond, quietly singing Figure 8 in that baby-doll voice.

Intermezzo - Schoolhouse Rock!

If you're a child of the `70s or `80s, you probably first heard Blossom Dearie's voice on Schoolhouse Rock!, the educational animated shorts that originally aired on Saturday mornings on the ABC network during the early `70s into the mid-'80s. Advertising exec David McCall had the original idea for Schoolhouse Rock! when trying to help one of his sons memorize the multiplication tables. As usual with kids, McCall's son seemed to remember the lyrics of pop songs effortlessly, and McCall wondered whether a catchy tune might be the key to help kids learn their three Rs. In a stroke of genius, McCall's agency commissioned be-bop great Bob Dorough to write a test tune, and Three Is A Magic Number was born. McCall's agency pitched the idea of an animated series based on the song idea to ABC, and Schoolhouse Rock! was on its way to becoming a Generation X legend.

Of course, the "Rock!" portion of Schoolhouse Rock! is a little misleading, as there's little rock-and-roll in the 52 episodes of the series. And you know, that may be what made Schoolhouse Rock! so memorable. Instead of forgettable bubblegum pop that the series could have easily adopted, we got catchy, jazzy tunes from greats such as Bob Dorough, Grady Tate, Blossom Dearie, and, of course.... Jack Sheldon.


[I'm Just a Bill - Jack Sheldon]


Finale - The Last Cat Standing

Jack Sheldon is one of those ubiquitous characters that you've seen or heard whether you know you have or not. If you're close to my age, you probably first encountered Jack as resident sidekick and foil to Merv Griffin, who - after the jokes and insults - would often break loose with just these incredible trumpet solos. Or maybe you saw him on the Dragnet series of the `60s and `70s. Jack would usually play the same character, sometimes the bewildered victim, sometimes a slightly drunk or drugged hipster witness. Or maybe you were a fan of his one-season series from the `60s, Run Buddy Run, a very loose comedy version of The Fugitive.

If you're a bit younger than me, you know Jack best from Schoolhouse Rock! of course, and I'm Just a Bill and Conjunction Junction (What's Your Function?). Sheldon would later parody his classic Just a Bill performance on both The Simpsons and Family Guy.

But, if you're a bit older than me, you probably know Jack Sheldon best as a jazz giant, collaborator with Dizzy Gillespie, Dexter Gordon, Frank Sinatra, Benny Goodman, Mel Torme, Lena Horne, Peggy Lee, and Rosemary Clooney, among many others. Blossom Dearie is one of those "others." Sheldon backed her on Dearie's probably most successful album, May I Come In?, and Jack was reportedly deeply in love with Blossom for a time.

Billy Crystal calls Jack Sheldon "the last cat standing," a man who survived drugs and a tough personal life and kept on going, still playing his music every day.

[Dylan on seeing Jack]

Our Host wasn't kidding, either. You can catch the Jack Sheldon Cool Quartet nearly any weekend at a variety of clubs in L.A. And in March of this year you can catch the premiere of a new documentary on Jack, "Trying to Get Good: The Jazz Odyssey of Jack Sheldon" at the Crest Majestic Theater in Westwood, CA.

Closing out our show tonight is Jack Sheldon performing the theme from The Sandpiper, a very bad movie starring, as one critic put it, "Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, and a bird." But that forgettable movie left us with an unforgettable piece of music... The Shadow of Your Smile, as played by Jack Sheldon.

[The Shadow of Your Smile - Jack Sheldon]

Sources: Most of the information on Blossom Dearie and Schoolhouse Rock! comes from their respective Wikipedia articles. Blossom's personal web site and her label - Daffodil Records - site are both closed, and the last information on her at the Verve Records site and on MySpace is from circa 2001. According to newspaper listings, she was still performing at Danny’s Skylight Room into 2004, and may have performed there up till the club closed in late 2006. While researching her whereabouts, I came across a unverified fan comment noting her retirement to Woodstock.

As well as his Wikipedia listing, information on Jack Sheldon came from his web site and the site of the new documentary on his life: "Trying to Get Good: The Jazz Odyssey of Jack Sheldon."

For an excellent synopsis of Sheldon's discography, I recommend this posting at the Rifftides site. A commenter there notes, "my wife and I stayed at a 5 unit court owned by Jack's aunt. His aunt taught babies how to swim and one of Jack's first albums has Jack, trumpet and baby swimming underwater." That album is Freaky Friday - no relation to either of the Disney movies - whose cover is reproduced above.

Like the late Down in the Flood show, the Destinyland podcast seems another unfortunate podfading victim, but still up on its site are two good episodes: one on Schoolhouse Rock! and one on Blossom Dearie. Both are recommended listening, as are all the Destinyland shows.

***

You've been listening to the Dreamtime podcast – occasional commentary on Bob Dylan's Theme Time Radio Hour. Dreamtime is researched and written by Fred Bals and is a Not Associated With production. As the name says, we're not associated with XM Radio, Bob Dylan, or much of anything else.

Some of the music on Dreamtime is provided via the Podsafe Music Network. Check it out at music.podshow.com.

Remember that the Dreamtime team loves to get email. You can write us at dreamtimepodcast@gmail.com

The Dreamtime top cats are Curly Lasagna and Shaggy Bear. Our announcers are the notorious honky-tonkin' sisters, Jailbait and Joyride.

Until next time, dream well.

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More commercial affiliations

apropos of our earlier post.

"...Anticipating Richard Hamilton by four years, Hank Williams first uttered the term pop art from the stage of the Grand Old Opry in 1952. Hank could see stretched out before him a future in which art would inextricably entwine with advertising. It was not an unappealing prospect, and Hank embraced it, envisioning museums filled with Brillo boxes and Ken-L-Ration labels and Goodyear Tires winged feet. He had always considered such works on a par with the output of the top European modernists, and all the more engaging because they had been devised by ordinary Americans without pretense, who got their hands dirty and enjoyed the song of the meadowlark at sunset.

He could imagine taking that song and fitting lyrics to it that would tell folks about Cities Service gasoline and Wheatena breakfast cereal, things he himself loved, and in return the gasoline people and the cereal people would put his name on a pump and his face on a box. It was all about people helping each other out, and it was also about the clean, uncluttered thrust of American imagery. He never quite understood why it was that when he visited a picture gallery, the paintings of streets never showed the Dr. Pepper signs and the Coppertone billboards and the barns were bereft of their Chew Mail Pouch in big letters. He thought it was a lot like pretending that people never had to go to the bathroom. It was like visiting somebody's house who had made a fortune running burlesque theaters and finding it full of plaster copies of Roman statues..."

~ Luc Sante

Hank Williams didn't really invent the term pop art on the Grand Ole Opry stage in 1952, but it's one of those things that might have happened in an alternate universe.

Dreamtime is busy putting together our next podcast - on Hank Williams and his death in the back of a Cadillac on a cold New Year's Day in 19 and 53, and synchronous to our research came across this publicity photo of Hank promoting Pops-Rite Popcorn ("Loads of Fun to Pop at Home"), which was evidently a fulfillment item that Pops-Rite - a Grand Ole Opry Sponsor - sent to listeners.

The Blevins Popcorn Co. was founded by James Victor Blevins in 1945. Blevins had been operating a Nashville food brokerage business when he noticed the movie industry boom was boosting sales of popcorn, and signed a contract to supply all the popcorn for a Middle Tennessee movie chain, marketing a hybrid corn that produced better-tasting, fluffier popcorn. Blevins was also instrumental in introducing popcorn to the home market when the movie biz started to slump in the `50s.

Blevins named the business' home base "Popcorn Village," as can be seen in the banner behind Williams, and dubbed himself both "Popcorn King" and "Mayor of Popcorn Village."

Besides Pops-Rite, Williams' sponsors on his 15-minute morning radio show on WSM included Duckhead Overalls and my personal favorite, Mother's Best Flour.

Bet Hank never said, "My music's too sacred, I won't sell pop-corn" either.

Edie Adams for Muriel Cigars

Hang in there if the smoke is getting to you, this is the last video tied to the "Smoking" episode.

The great Ernie Kovacs married actress and singer Edie Adams on September 12, 1954 in Mexico City. From all reports, Adams was smitten with Kovacs, and remained his #1 fan even after his death. Adams once said about Kovacs, "He treated me like a little girl, and I loved it - Women's Lib be damned!".

Although Kovacs' hassles with the IRS and Adams subsequent work to pay off his debt are well-known, I hadn't heard the story Dylan relates about her allergies to cigar smoke. But if true, it must have been tough on Adams given that Kovacs was a cigar smoker at the level of a George Burns or Desi Arnaz. In any case, Adams was the pitch-lady for Muriel cigars both before and well after Kovacs' death, and her trademark, "Why don't you pick one up and smoke it sometime?" modeled after the signature Mae West line, became a buzz phrase in the U.S. I can remember intoning it myself while on the playground.

Here's Adams in triplicate selling that ceegar which could be had in those days for just a thin dime.

The Flintstones for Winston Cigarettes

Fred and Barney flog cigarettes, possibly providing the reason why the Bedrock civilization died out.

It should be pointed out that even in the depths of `60s Madison Avenue greed and lack of concern for public safety that this commercial wasn't deliberately targeted to the kiddie krowd, although I'm sure if Winston hooked a few kidlets in, they weren't weeping. The original early 1960s version of The Flintstones was a prime-time animated series, and the episodes -if not exactly high-brow - were as much written for adults as they were for kids.

Winston would discontinue its sponsorship of the series in 1963, after Wilma became pregnant with Pebbles, and the healthier Welch's Grape Juice would take over as primary sponsor.

Cadillac Bob - Where the Rubber Meets the Road

What XM Radio describes as an online "video vignette." The original can be found at the Bob Dylan and Cadillac section of XM, which includes a :30-sec video and a half-hour excerpt from the upcoming Cadillac show, scheduled to be broadcast on October 24th.

XM/Cadillac is, in my opinion kind of missing the march on not creating this as am embeddable video a la the recent flash card viral video campaign that was so successful for Sony, and dropping this call-to-action in at the end...

Find more information on cadillac at www.cadillac.com and www.mycadillacstory.com.

Commercial Affiliations

"We've got time for an email now, before we get to the end of the week. Let's go to the email basket. This one comes from Jackie Vann from Manhattan. Jackie writes, 'Bob, I know that Sheryl Crow is a friend of yours, but what is your take on her using Buddy Holly's great Not Fade Away for a TV hair dye commercial? I felt the most awful, stinging disappointment when I first heard it. I felt betrayed by Crow, as I'm almost sure Buddy would have. He was such a stickler for controlling his own material. I can't imagine his liking this commercial adaptation.'

"Well Jackie, I have to disagree with you. When's the last time you heard Buddy Holly on the radio? There aren't a lot of shows like Theme Time Radio Hour. A lot of people get to hear commercials, and if it makes one person curious about either Buddy or Sheryl, I'm all for it. How many people never heard of Nick Drake until he was in a car commercial?






"A lot of musicians have always been proud to have commercial affiliation. Sonny Boy Williamson sold flour. I can't imagine Sonny Boy saying, 'My blues is too sacred. I wouldn't sell flour.' Jimmie Rodgers sold biscuits. Sheryl Crow sells hair dye. More power to her.




"And Jackie, have you ever seen a Victoria's Secret ad?" - Bob Dylan, Theme Time Radio Hour, "Days of the Week" episode.