Tag: Rita Abrams

This was started in 2016, originally a mix focusing on the psychedelic and funky tunes from children's TV and kid's records in the 60's and 70's and beyond on programs such as Play School, Picture Box, Children of the Stones, The Changes, Rainbow, Play Away, Vegetable Soup, Hot Fudge, Lidsville, Chigley, Camberwick Green, Sesame Street and further private press (space) oddities. But it's my birthday soon, so I thought I do it as a theme podcast! Lucky you, etc. It's a lot of great tunes that are lost on dusty old records and long-forgotten programs, and it's been a very deep dive over the years, and well worth a listen. P-S-Y-C-H Psych Away SCHOOl Breaks Are Over! (207Mb, 2:34) Listen to RC 380: PSYCH SCHOOL: Play School Breaks, Psych & Funk byRadio Clash on hearthis.at Freddie Phillips with Brian Cant - Music Box The Hat Band - Welcome, Welcome, Welcome Play Away - The Party Is About To Begin Telltale - Walk In The Country Matt Berry - Rainbow Rick Jones - Bang On A Drum Susan & The Kids - Someday, Little Children The Roches - Postcard Rod, Jane & Roger - What's Behind The Moon Iwo Zaluski & The Children From Park Lane Primary School Wembley - The First And Second Days (An Odd Spacvity, Aurora Borealis) Fred Leslie's Missing Link - Pinball Number Count Joe Beard - Its OK To Say No Lionel Morton - Come To The Shops Ray Ellis & Norm Prescott - The Secrets of Isis Theme (Intro & Outro) Billy De Wolfe - Don't Dress Your Cat In An Apron Diana Ross - When We Grow Up The Free Design - Love You Carole King - One Was Johnny The Postmarks - Pinball Number Count Miss Abrams and the Strawberry Point 4th Grade Class - Running In The Green Grass Vegetable Soup, Episode #1 - Being Alone / Minority Bert And Ernie - Imagination Bruce Haack - Soul Transportation Brian Cant & Carole Ward - All The Fish In The Sea Fiona Fullerton - Curiouser And Curiouser Larry Santos - Enjoy The Year You're Living Bruce Haack - Mudra Paddy Kingsland - The Devil's Children Mike Batt - Simon In The Land Of Chalk Drawings Bruce Haack - Touch The Blasting Company - Into The Unknown Jacques Lasry - Manège Roger Limb - Ghost in the Water Sidney Sager and The Ambrosian Singers - Narrowing Circle Bill Bailey - Magic Roundabout Kazoo Kid - Special Friends (Rodion Drozdov Vapourwave remix) Joe Beard - What Does A Bad Person Look Like Little Marcy - Be Careful What You Do Rod, Jane & Roger - Happy Sad Miss Abrams and the Strawberry Point 4th Grade Class - Sad Night Rosey Grier - It's All Right To Cry John Barry - The Me I Never Knew The Free Design - Scarlet Tree Susan & Gordon - Picture A World Rick Jones - Splodges Roosevelt Franklin - Skin I'm In Telltale - Autumn's Really Here Miss Abrams and the Strawberry Point 4th Grade Class - I Never Asked Freddie Phillips - Chigley Theme Lotte Kestner - I'm Going To Go Back There Someday Lionel Morton - Fearless Fred's Amazing Animal Band The Hat Band - Stop Him, Stop Him, Stop Him Transcript Hello welcome to Radio Clash, it's 380, it's a birthday podcast, and also a theme podcast, yay!It's Psych School, Play School Breaks and Kids Funk.Hello welcome to Radio Clash, this is 380, and it's Psych School, Play School, breaks and kids funk.It's a theme podcast, yeah, don't run away, and it's also, I'm nearly 50, so it seemed totallyappropriate to look back to my youth, and before then as well, to various kids themes that arepsychedelic, Pop Sike, as they call it, as the kids call it, honestly they're not really kids,and funk and breaks, and even a few themes that have been sampled as well, so there's a couple ofthat, there's an amazing, people can spot the two, there's at least two in here that have been sampledquite famously, and yes as I say, it's my, I'm creating my birthday thinking about the past,and I know this podcast isn't really going to hit it with the people who are just into mashups andthings like that, but it's, it makes me happy, this podcast makes me happy, and it's my podcast,so anyway, and you hear in the background the instrumental version I made of theMurgatroyd band, otherwise known as the Spencer Davis Group, and their theme to Magpie, which Iwas a bit too young for Magpie, stopped in 1980, although the television was there, televisionwasn't really available to me until we moved down south in 79, so it was kind of on in thebackground, but I don't remember Magpie, but I remember Blue Peter, and it was a kind of aBlue Peter, kind of a clone or a, a response to Blue Peter, and that comes from 1972, and at thestart we had, we just heard a play away, the party is about to begin, that's from 1973, I lovedplay away, I never understood the difference between Play School and play away, Play School cameearlier, I think Play School was one of the earliest, if not the earliest, it might even be the firston BBC, when BBC 2 started in 68, it was one of the first, well not the first kids show, but evenone of the first UK kids shows that was specifically aimed at that sort of younger age group, and thenplay away came in the 70s, it was a bit more cool and hip, less of a set, I don't remember, and thenbefore that we had a little bit of the hat band, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome from Lidsville, that'sI think a direct rip from the audio, and I don't know if I should play that, because obviously I'mcovering not just UK and British kids program, but around the world as an American, that's from theSid and Marty Krofft show Lidsville, which is, I mean it's H.R. Pufnstuf, and Lidsville, and allthose things, it's really psychedelic in the world of kids television, those are definitelypsychedelic, very pop, psychedelic, very bubblegum, the music, but there's certainly something verytrippy about the stuff, and then right at the start, the granddaddy of a lot of fascination withrural folk, pastoral things, that's Music Box, Freddie Phillips with Brian Cant, although Brian Cantisn't on that track, that's from 1975, and that's from Camberwick Green, so we're gonna buy the trackwhich started this whole mix, I mean this actually started 2016 is when I planned this podcast,initially then, because I wasn't running the podcast, it was supposed to be a mix, and it'staken me seven years to get around to it, partly because it was a bit like, how am I gonna sellthis, is anyone gonna be interested, but I do think there is a real interesting time in thelate 60s, early 70s, and later on we've got some stuff in the 80s, 90s, 90s and 10s, but mostlythat sort of 70s period where there was a crossover between the psychedelic music of the time, whichwas getting quite obsessed with Juvenilia and Alice in Wonderland and very trippy kids things,there was a crossover because obviously that was in the charts, and then those people startedto be employed to work on kids shows, and the next band is one of those, a band called Telltale,who a lot of people do know Telltale's music intimately, but they probably don't know that,because they wrote the theme to Rainbow, which was again ITV's response, I think really to playschool, and so it was very hard to find this, there was an album called Songs from Rainbow,from 1973, and I have to say the whole rare groove, rare record thing, it pales infinitesimally,when you're actually looking for kids records, because those things aren't preserved, and that'swhy I'm trying to say here is a lot of really interesting stuff was done in an arena wherenobody was watching over the age of about 10, so it's an interestingly fertile area that peoplehaven't really covered that much, a bit, this is deep dive, this is a very deep dive, and so thisis Telltale and Walk in the Country, and this is the track that inspired this whole podcast mix idea.So, that was Iwo ZaLuski, and The Children from Park Lane Primary School, Wembley, in 1974.Now, a lot of people have heard about the Langley Schools Music Project, which was a Canadian thingwhere a music teacher got the children to sing pop hits of the day. Now, several years before that,we had Iwo Zaluski doing a similar thing except with original pieces or semi-original pieces,a mix of things that he wrote and things that were hits around that time or other things, soit's called the first and second days, it's like a semi-biblical, very trippy idea about thedocumenting the music of the early days of the world in that sort of biblical fashion.So, it's first and second days, an odd spack-fitty, or space-fitty, comma aurora borealis,now referring to space oddity, but actually, borrowing tubular bells. That's part of tubularbells by Mike Oldfield. So, it's a mix of original, not original, and it was released in1994 on a private press record. So, it was a pretty lonely music project by several years,but not known about until fairly recently, the last couple of years, I knew about it a while agofor a trunk record and Johnny Trunk. It's a mad record, I could play several of them,they've gone for quite a long, but it is like this children's music psych epic, it's insane.That gets reprised right at the end with Morning is Broken. So, it's like Mike OldfieldCat Stevens mash-up going on. That's crazy. Then before that, we had, oh, we had to have someRod Jane and Roger, although, and most people don't know them as Rod Jane and Freddy, but originally,it was Rod Jane and Matt, as in Matthew Corbett, as in Sutty, but when his father died, he tookover Sutty until fairly recently. Matthew Corbett's still doing it, I can't really still lie,will not be. So, he left, and then Roger Walker came along and stood in until 1980, and then heleft, and then when Jane and Freddy existed, and most people already know them, not Rod Jane andFreddy, they were the in-house singing troupe on Rainbow, and that's What's Behind the Moon,and I don't know what date it is, but I'm thinking it's 1980. It has to be between 1976 and 1980,so somewhere between that. And then before that, we had The Roches. They did an album in 1994called Will You Be My Friend for Kids, and that's Postcard. There's quite a few legit people havedone kids' albums. I mean, I wanted to include some Harry Nilsson, but I'm not so into it,but there is a film called The Point, an album, and things you could have had, as well as theSpencer Davis Group, something from The Bugaloos. The Bugaloos were a Sid and Marty Krofft, verypsychedelic thing about some singing bugs. One of those 70 shows where everyone sings songs,it's a bit like The Monkees, except more pop psych, but I might use one of those as a backinglayer. It's annoying because it seems like the Marty Krofft stuff is mostly UMG, and there'sa few other things they've had to pop. This podcast has been shrinking as they go througheverything. No, not that one, not that one, not that one. It's very irritating. And then beforeThe Roches, we had Susan and the Kids from Sesame Street. That's Someday Little Children.That's quite forward-thinking about Someday Little Children on the Moon or other planets.And that's from 1971. That's from the second Sesame Street album, actually. And then before that,we had Rick Jones, Bang on the Drum. That's from either Play Away or Play School. And it's from1973 on an album called Bang on the Drum. And you probably know Rick Jones as Yoffy from FingerMouse. And I've forgotten he used to be part of early on Play School or Play Away, one or two.But he then branched out into being Yoffy. There's probably, well, I can't really moonlight ifyou're in front of the camera, but yeah, I'm not sure why he calls himself Yoffy.Then before that, we had Matt Berry with his cover of Rainbow from 2018's Television Themes.I've always been a bit annoyed about Matt Berry. I love him, and well, not anymore,because of a certain person who wrote it. I loved IT Crowd. And then obviously,Graham Linehan had to destroy it with his transphobia. But I love when he plays charactersand Garth Marengi and that kind of thing. I'm not too sure about his music. I don't know whetherhe's been ironic or I assume after so many albums, he must be genuine, but I never totally sure. ButI like the TV Themes album television theme. And if you think, oh, well, he made it more psych,he made it much more trippy. No, he did not. The telltale track is exactly including thatreally weird colour of the rainbow. It goes all really tripped out. That is the original. That'sthe middle part of it, which they didn't play on the TV show. They played them at the start andthe end, I think. So it does have this really strange, unused middle bit. And then we had anintroduction. It says Rod Matt and Jane. Yeah, I'm going to go for mentioning Matt Corbett,introducing the characters of Rainbow. I think that's the YouTube bit. Some of these are YouTubehave to have to be YouTube rips because that, for instance, like the Rod Jane and Roger track wasnever released. And it's also a bit of a fudge, because if I take it from the actual TV showsrecordings, it's a different set of rights to if it was released on a record. So, you know,it doesn't count if it's the same thing. But, you know, yeah, that's the kind of fudge I'm goingfor the Lidsville, because Lidsville was never released on a record. So I'm hoping it has norelationship with UMG, even though other Sid and my crossings were released on Decca, I think,one of the UMG or Interscope was in re-release and Interscope. So yeah, irritating. Then we heardWalk in the Country by Telltale, which has our Bonzos and Bonzos are another one that were onkids TV well before they were in the charts. And I could put any bonzos in here, but I've playedbonzos so much on the podcast that I don't think there's much left to play. So I just mentallybought them in a bit like The Bugaloos, put them mentally in here, they should be here.And it's the same with the background Doctor Who. I've played so many versions of the Doctor Whotheme. We won't go for the obvious things. This isn't supposed to be a nostalgia podcast,this is supposed to be a podcast that has nostalgic things in it, certain people,but a bit like the Iwo Zaluski. Most people don't know that shit. And that's the point.Semi nostalgic, but also a trip into a literal trip into things you probably won't know. And Itook a lot of deep diving to find. So we can't do a podcast without having the next June. In fact,I've actually got two versions of this song in here because I've done I've mashups with this song,I've done videos with this song. It's one of my favorite Sesame Street songs of all time.And it's also DJ Nono's favorite as well. So this is Pinball Number Count by Fred Leslie's MissingLink.That was Miss Abrams and the Strawberry Point Fourth Grade Class. That's the long story.Rita Abrams used to be in bands and write for bands, moved to Mill Valley, California,and became an elementary teacher with a third grade class. And then they recorded a demo,Mauro's live performance. So she wrote a song called Mill Valley about Mill Valley with thesekids. And it became a big hit, a massive hit when it was released by the record label who heard it,when this is genius, obviously seeing lots of dollar signs on their eyes. So then an albumcalled Miss Abrams and the Strawberry Point Fourth Grade Class, we went up to fourth grade,but the album happened. And that's from 1972. And I describe it really, it's sort of very,I would say pop, bubblegum, pop psychedelic. But yeah, you can hear it see it in stars and stuff.It's not the usual pop stuff. It is, there is an element of almost like a rural hippie thing.And that's what seemed to be happening. A lot of you are moving out into the sticks,moving away from cities into a Victorian and we'll get into the Victorian stuff later.It's Victorian back to basics, rural life. And there seem to be a lot of women and girlsin Victorian dresses on television in the mid seventies. And of course, Bagpuss being one ofthose. And Bagpuss should be here. I'm surprised it isn't. But yeah, you know, we're not doinga nostalgia thing. Bagpuss is definitely trippy. Then before that, we had the Postmarks withPinball Number Count. That's from 2008, buying the numbers. I love that. It's very sort ofslow dive indie version of that track. Not what you expect. And I use both,Andre, DJ Nona use both of those in a recent matchup, the various versions of pinball count.Then before that, from a musical called Really Rosie, that's Carole King with Bon West Johnny.That's from 1975. Really Rosie was a musical with Maurice Sendak where the wild things are.And it was originally a book and Carole King to the music for the musical, which then became aanimated special. And I was just looking up the fact that they had to omit one of the tracksof the re-release DVD collection, Maurice Sendak stories, because one of the songs was the riskof imitating the characters with self-strangulation. It was a wild time in the 70s.The original Sesame Street episode, the first one, I've got this on DVD, has children playingin a construction site. And not as a warning, they just play in a construction site.Hmm, that's not so great. Then before that, we had Diana Ross. Probably Diana Ross, as you've neverheard her before. That's when we grow up from a brilliant album called Free to Be, You and Me,from 1972. And that was an album that was wasn't really connected to anything. I think there wasan animated, there was only a live action, because there's a live action version, which came a fewyears later actually features Michael Jackson as well, this single duet, which is strange. Butit's very much about the 70s preoccupation about child psychology and people being themselves.This thing's about gender. I don't know if I've played Williams Doll on the podcast, but WilliamsDoll, narrated by Mel Brooks. There's one where there's Marla Thomas and Mel Brooks discuss whetherthey're male or female. There's a track I'll play later by Rosey Grier about it's Alright to cry.And there's the whole thing about housework, which should be shared as a brilliant album,but it's very radical for its time, I think. And part of the album was the previous song was theBilly DeWolf with don't dress your cat in an apron about being yourself. Then before that,we had Ray Ellis and Norm Prescott under assumed name for the actual thing. You'll see differentnames, but it's actually them. That's The Secrets of ISIS theme. And yeah, ISIS means many elsenowadays. But back in the 70s, it was a comic strip character, I think related to Shazam. Somaybe iWillBattle will know about Isis. I've watched little bits of it sort of live action mixedwith animation. Typical superheroes stuff a bit like Wonder Woman, but interestingly Egyptianthemed, it makes it a bit more trippy. Then before that, we had Lionel Morton with come to theshops. That's I think from Play School, but could be play away. It's one of the albums where it'sboth of them. And then before that, we had Joe Beard. It's okay to say no. And that is a strange,strange album. The album is called it's okay to say no. It's a Kid's Stuff album from 1985.You get a lot of these moral panic or these educational kids records and kids stuff prettymuch specialized in those and also TV and film times, cheap ones. And I don't know if it is JoeBeard. I mean, this is from the 365 Days Project is from WFMU the blog. They did a whole thingcalled Strictly Kids, which is a lot of these are strange, demented or interesting kids music,sort of forgotten stuff. A long album all about stranger danger. It's very different from theinnocence of the 70s. It's got more into not everyone is a good person. And we'll come backto that in a bit. And then before that, we had Pinball Number Count by Fred Leslie's Missing Link.So in the 70s, Sesame Street wasn't just the only PBS educational product or educational TV show inthe United States. One of them was a very strange one called Vegetable Soup. And there seem to bea lot of these things where we're talking about, you know, sort of social things, maybe for olderchildren, social things, had songs and animation, you know, they were sort of copying this SesameStreet idea of magazine program of animations. But also quite often Sesame Street did coverquite hard stuff, but it was always a bit more gentle, whereas some of the stuff was a bit moredirect. And this is one of them. I think it was funded by New York actually, the New York Council.And this is from the first episode of 1975. This is Being Alone Minority.And that was The Devil's Children by Paddy Kingsland. And that's from the series, The Changes,from 1955. I love Peter Dickinson books. And I've played various bits from the Paddy Kingslandsoundtrack a few years ago when it was re-released. And you can hear in the background as well.I love it. It's a mix of sitar and electronic and medieval and, you know, because there'sseat characters and then there's a medieval thing and it's a real hodgepodge. But the whole thingabout Britain going mad and smashing technologies, weirdly timely. Then before that, we had BruceHaack. We had to have some Bruce Haack in here because if there's anyone that's probably done the mostpsychedelic, strange, weirdest children's records, it's Bruce Haack with Miss Elizabethand occasionally with Ted Pandell. And that was Mudra with Miss Elizabeth and her childrenfrom The Way Out Record for Children, 1968. Bruce Haack built his own synthesizers. I'm wonderingwhen I was hearing that was there was actually, there seemed to be some sitar in there, be SantaVeracoded. And I wouldn't butt past Bruce Haack to build his own Veracoder either. But you too canbe a butterfly. Then before that, we had Larry Santos. Enjoy the year you're living. That's froma show called Hot Fudge, which was mid to late 70s. And Larry Santos wrote Candy Girl by theFour Seasons. So he was a songwriter, but he was on the show with a puppet called Seymour.I think I've seen footage of that. I mean, a lot of these things are on YouTube. So you can checkthem out on YouTube. I know definitely Vegetable Soup is on YouTube because they are in the filmarchive, the National Film Archive, the American one, their version of the BFI. And I think they'reactually legally on YouTube because they're public money. It's public accessible. Then before that,we had Fiona Fullerton with Curiouser and Curiouser. I mentioned Alice in Wonderland. That's fromthe film, Alice in Wonderland from 1972, the live action film. I've never seen that. But the musicwas by John Barry. And I think I've played that either on this podcast or maybe on the podcastI did on the library, 100. I know I'd played one of the John Barry, Alice in Wonderland tracks onthat podcast. Then before that, we had Brian Cant and Carole Ward with All The Fish in the Sea. That'sfrom 1972 Play School and you might recognise it from somewhere. Then before that, we had BruceHaack again with Soul Transportation. How trippy is that? You might become all one child. Thisis that was 1972. And that's from Dance to the Music. But they did an album called the AtronicRecord for Children. And the Way Out Record for Children is obviously a reference to the WayOut record by Perrey and Kingsley. The Way Out sound or sound from the Way Out way. I forget thename at the moment. The one that Beastie Boy has ripped off for their cover. But yeah, there was alot of The Way Out records, which is all about sort of the early electronic sounds. And theydid one for kids. And I say there for kids, they actually were released as tapes. But under herrecord label, they released tens of records. I mean, there was at least 10 records from BruceHaack and probably more. Yeah, Miss Nelson. Why say Miss Nelson? I mean, Miss Nelson. Was itElizabeth Nelson? Esther Nelson. Oh, I got that wrong. So it was Esther Nelson. Why did you sayMiss Elizabeth? But yes, it was Esther Nelson. Yeah, very, very trippy. The soul ship. And ina similar vein, you had Bert Nerny talking about imagination. That is an older song very early.I mean, I think back to the early Sesame Street 72-73. Originally. But that was a bigger castversion from 1996 with, you know, Big Bird and various other people talking about it. And thatone actually, although the original imagination is about, obviously, Bert can't get to sleep. Andthen Nerny sings it in the original. And then Bert sings the end of it. But it's about using yourimagination and not being scared of the dark and using your imagination to get to sleep.That version is a little bit more trippy talking about the little shapes you see when you closeyour eyes and that kind of thing. And that almost like meditation. That's interesting. And thenin the start of the section, we had Vegetable Soup being a lone minority, which I don'tknow if that's the name of it, but yes. So probably one of the people that is very predominant in thesort of psych, pop, psych world and the crossover to children's music is Mike Battt. Mike Battt ofthe Wombles did all the Wombles songs. I'm not playing a Wombles song, hardly because they'renot really that psychedelic. They're more pop. They're more glam pop, glam rock pop. But he doescome from a pop psych psychedelic background. Fading yellow is one of his, I think you willfind Mike Battt's work on those very obscure bubblegum pop psych pop compilations that you willfind out there. And I didn't know I had to look it up. But one of the things I found was a film fairanimated series of nice before called Simon in the Land of Chalk Drawings. It is very trippy.Every way that Simon gets out of something, he draws a character and it comes to life. It'spretty insane. So this is Mike Battt, Simon in the Land of Chalk Drawings. There's not him singing.And that was unreleased at the time. I wonder why. That was Sad Night by Miss Abrams and theStrawberry Point Fourth Grade Class. We'll hear more of them in a bit. But yeah, that was unreleasedat the time. It's kind of quite a heavy song. I've talked about death in a kids song. Not manykids songs do that. And then before that, we had Rod Jane and Roger with Happy Sad. I mentallysing that one when my friends are happy or sad. I do. And then before that, we had Little Marceyjust to haunt your dreams. That's be careful what you do. We've had Little Marcey on the podcastbefore and Little Marcey was a Christian doll nightmare fuel. And that's from 1966. And theSad Night is from 1972. And I don't really know when the Happy Sad is from. It's up to 1976,1980, some point in those times. Yeah, a bit like Little Markie. It's just like, oh my dear.Some good songs though. But yeah, Christian, heavily Christian. Yeah, let's scare kids withan omnipotent being spying on them at all points. That's going to go well. And then before that,we had Joe Beard again with what does a bad person look like, which is kind of weird. It's kind oflike Jaunty Jao's song about strangers and people being evil, even if you don't know they're evil,that goes into us Toccata in Fugue thing. You can see why the WFMU was all over that stuff.And that's from 1985. Okay, to say no, I must for every parent and child are never talked tostrangers. 46 page colouring book and full length recording. Yes. Yeah, we had a bit of a darksection at that point, because I mean, I can't do a thing about psych and children things aregoing into the more outside of strange stuff. And also the fact that there was some prettyscary stuff on television in the 70s and 80s and 60s. And there was some really dementedstuff for children, which now we might go, maybe that wasn't a good idea. I don't know. I mean,I think things are a bit too sanitized now when it comes to kids stuff. I mean, you look at SesameStreet dealing with the death of the old man that was a friend of Big Bird's. I'm not sure televisionshows would do that now. But yes, it's not necessarily good for children this bit. And thenbefore that, we had a vapor wave remix of Kazoo kid, which is the kid that was on the you andKazoo, which if you look on YouTube, you'll find millions of YouTube poop tube shitposts stuffusing it. It was from 1989. And it was a video, I think you bought with a kazoo with this kidat the end, he sang the song weirdly without Kazoo called Special Friends. And that's theRodion Drozdov Vaporwave remix. So I can't find it on Rodion still has a channel. And I can'tfind that on there at all. So I don't know what happened to the original version. Maybe it gotcopyright. Then before that, we had Bill Bailey talking about magic around about out of somethingabout magic around about the annoyingly, the original recording doesn't exist. It seems likethe version you find on compilations is sounds like it's been taken straight off an old TV tape.It's not a very good copy of the theme. But it was a quite a weird theme in a way. And it was a verypsychedelic program. Then before that, we had Sydney Sager or Sydney Sager or Sydney Sagerand the embroidery of singers with narrowing circle from the scariest children's televisionseries of all time, Children of the Stones. And I don't say this lightly. I've watched a lot ofdark weird strange children stuff as you do back in the day and recently. And it still holds up asthe scariest thing ever. People were scared about the Picture Box theme, which was earlier in thatsection. But Children of the Stone was actually genuinely scary stuff. It's from 1975. Trunkreleased a album of it. The album seems to have been taken from the dub copy, which when theyproduce a TV series or whatever, they have an instrumental version for which people dub over.Well, in a way, I've just taken the bits in between the voices. But quite often there is aversion that survives, even if the original master tapes are lost. But they still got foley noises,you know, the sounds of people talking or whatever, which actually makes it weirdly a bit like thewicker man, which is not for kids children, the wicker man soundtracks where people have createdversions with extender stuff, which isn't in the original soundtrack. But there's bits of thefoley recording, people moving and stuff. It actually sounds weirdly spookier because it wasweird random sounds over the top because you've got no image of it. So yeah, but that's a narrowingcircle. And yeah, I've been watching a lot of these as you do because I've been looking throughfor various versions. One of them is Ghost in the Water by Roger Limb. Well, the theme is by RogerLimb from release in 1983, but actually the, I think it was a bit earlier in the 80s. But that'sBBC TV. TV for schools, I think it was. I think it was a one trial thing that might have beenserialised. A historical ghost story about a modern day girl and person she, her friend saysshe's in love with and she's not. Investigating a Victorian tragedy. Back to Victorians again.And yeah, that's pretty spooky stuff. And even worse is Come Back Lucy. I'm pretty sure thatwhoever did the whole spoilt Victorian child blog probably named themselves after the character inCome Back Lucy, you know, called Alice. Of course, of course the, the character is called Alice,but the, the character of Alice is really, really scary and dangerous. Worse than Ghostand it is demented stuff. And it just seemed to be the 70s. The filter came off with that kind ofstuff. I mean, we're diverging into folk horror stuff here, but yeah, there was some stuff whichwas genuinely scary. There was just TV for schools or, you know, Dark Towers is another one from youand me. And interestingly, I came across a very early version of Baldrick. Tony Robinson. I mustbe very young at Tony Robinson on me and you in like 71 or 72. I think it was 71 playing a detective.I didn't realise that you and me was the strand in BBC TV for schools, which was about reading andhe quite often had either dramatic things interwoven, but like little short little stories, one of thosebeing Dark Towers, which is a ghost story. And he would like take the words, the letter from thething and spell it out. And quite famously, there'd be the little animation or even a character wasgoing up and down across, you know, doing all the letter forming stuff. So it was kind of likefor younger children. And some of the stories were like, okay, that's a bit weird. And everyoneremembers Cosmo and Dibbs. Partly because Cosmo and Dibbs are really annoying with Gary Willmott,usually. But I was more The Crow. There was a Crow and I think a Mouse, which is before that.But I didn't realise before that we had the era of, I think Dark Towers. And then you hada few things before that you had Tony Robinson playing Sam a detective.Yeah, I talked about the Picture Box. There was a BBC TV TV schools series called Picture Box,which was a kind of a strand of like, you know, you go to various things and you know,show a factory or whatever, I don't know, that kind of maybe like investigate thing would just be,there wouldn't be a presenter, it just be pictures and maybe a narration. And it had a very weirdthing of a crystal box moving to Manège by Jacques Lasry. And that was a thing done on a glassinstrument called a Baschet and a Baschet or Baschet, Baschet, I think it is, Baschet Brothers worked withJacques Lasry. But that was a piece heated on their instruments, which is glass rods. Hence why thatreally weird thing and the Structures Sonores, which is the group, the group or the label wascalled structures sonores was terrible, terrible organization was the inspiration for the radiofunny workshop. They were inspired by the stuff done by Structures Sonores and want to do somethingsimilar. Interestingly, it wasn't electronic, it was glass rods and special instruments. Butyeah, that was some scary stuff. That is a very haunting theme. Then before that, we had theBlasting Company from Over the Garden Wall, that's into the unknown. That's a modern theme.And whereas the Manages from 1967, that's from 2017, more than 50, 60 years between those two.But I'm not sure if Over the Garden Wall was for children. I don't really know. It's a spooky,spooky cartoon. It's about children, but I'm not sure it's for children. And then before that,we had Touch by Bruce Haack from Together from 1971, which is more demented stuff,but it is based around I think that's programming. It was for the music is actuallybased around something he did for Electric Lucifer, I think, not a good friend. He did thatsometimes he took stuff like blowjob and made it snow job for bytes, which is mid 80s. So hequite often took the things I did a version of programming and that as well, but sort of morecomputer. Yes. Then the start section, we had Mike Batt with Simon and the Land of ChalkDrawings in 1974. And again, that's directly from a recording. I'm hoping UMG won't come to mebecause they own the film fair catalog. But I can't remember who owns that. I mean,there's a difference between records and the recordings on the television.So it gets very hard to work out who owns what and some of these things.So now I play a track by Rosey Grier, which is another track from Free to Be You and Me.And this is called It's Alright to Cry.It's Alright to Cry.That was the Chigley theme by Frank Phillips and Brian Cant.Again, just Freddie Phillips there from 1969. Ah, Chigley. Chigley was a precursor ofCamberwick Green and Trumpton. We played Trumpton as a background. Do we play as a background?Really? I can't remember. Anyway, I think we did. And I've got to say at the last section,I played Brady Bunch, Drummer Man in the background, but it's one of the ones I can't play because ofUMG, the Big Bad. And in the background is the Bugalooz. This is an instrumental I've createdof Senses of the World. Brilliant song, again, in UMG. Then before that, we had Miss Abrams,read on her own, really. I mean, it's still credited as, and the Strawberry Point 4th gradeclass, but they didn't have gone out that day. It's quite a heavy song, but it wasn't the album.I never asked. I mean, unlike The Sad Night, which was on release, that was part of the album,and it seems to be about the death of relationships, which, I mean, you know, as I say,you know, you could learn these things. And then before that, we had Telltale from 1973.The Autumn's Really Here. That's a beautiful song. Yeah, very evocative of those two. That's why Iput them together at endings. It's my birthday. It's always about endings and beginnings. As youget older, birthdays are less exciting, less about happy things, more about, oh, another year gone,and it's, yeah, it's all, it all gets a bit more existential as you get older. That's what you'llfind out, children. This is not a children's podcast, as you might have guessed. There is anexplicit tag on it for a reason. I might take out, I might make sure there's no swearing, but yes,these are kids songs from the past eras, which not necessarily means that they're good forchildren today. Then before that, we had Roosevelt Franklin talking about things which got changedbecause they weren't right later on. That's Skin I'm In from 971. Roosevelt Franklin was a muppet,which is incredibly popular in the early parts of Sesame Street, created by Matt Robinson,who played Gordon. I think he was the first Gordon, though that's been three,Gordons it gets really confusing. And I'm pretty sure that's Matt Robinson singing onthe previous song as well with Susan Picture A World. You can hear that there's a political thingwith Sesame Street and the thing about civil rights, and it was intended as a unified street ofdifferent people. The thing about Roosevelt Franklin, which pissed off, seemed to be everybodywho pissed him off, was that a very smart, used to take over the lessons and teach other children,which seemed to be like a bad influence, so it's like disruptive, but also spoke in,but then it would have called Jive. Now it's called AAVE, African American Vernacular,I don't know what the E ends for, but you know, code switching. And they spoke very much inthat sort of thing. And that pissed off, obviously, the more right-wing traditional people thatpissed them off. And then, yeah, it seemed like, is this a bad influence to children? So it gotcancelled. But even though Roosevelt Franklin was an incredibly popular character and had somereally big albums, several albums, very funky, very cool, and still very pertinent, the skin I'm inis about black pride. And there are people nowadays that want to hide any critical race theory andhide anything that shows racism in the history books. And yeah, it's amazing. If there wassomething like Roosevelt Franklin, it even Fox news would have a heart attack. And then beforethat, in between the two Sesame Street, we had Rick Jones with Splodges from Play School.And yeah, there might be a subtext in that as well about being not square. You've got to rememberthat Johnny Ball. And I think Rick Jones, who's Canadian, I think, used to smoke dope on the setof Play School. And I would definitely, Johnny Ball's one of them. But yeah, they used to getall kinds of things. Yes, things you don't know as a child. And then before that, I had the Susanand Gordon with Picture World, which is an amazing song and also an amazing sentiment. And yeah,I'd like to picture a world where everyone loves each other. I mean, that was the thing aboutSesame Street is trying to push the idea of everyone getting on. It's not a bad idea. And thenbefore that, we had the Free Design again, the Scarlet Tree from Sing For Very Important People,bonus track, but it's, again, quite a pagan track. Very folk, yes. And then the start of the sectionwe had John Barry, The Me I Never Knew, and then Rosey Grier. It's Alright to Cry and both fromSesame Street 2. And yeah, Alice in Wonderland again, which is, Alice in Wonderland is such atrippy thing. I mean, it's not just White Rabbit by Jefferson Airplane. So, we reached the endof the podcast. I hope you enjoyed this experiment and this foray into kids' musicand music for kids or music even made by the kids. That is the more psychedelic, funky,breakbeat side of probably what not what you were thinking and also dredging up some reallyforgotten stuff. I mean, I'm very happy I made it, but there's only one track I could buy. Andhello to me. Well, there's two. It was either going to be Rainbow Connection or the other one,which is I'm going to go back there someday. And this is a brilliant cover by Lotte Kestner,who is from Trespasser's William have played on the podcast and originally and has drenched outat Lotte Kestner. And everyone's now, we talked about in the last podcast, how everyone was talkingabout her because a cover of true faith or a version of her cover of true faith was used inthe last of us. And then the actual her version was used in later on in an episode as well.So this is I'm going to go back there someday. And then after it, we're going to have LionelMorton with Fearless Fred's amazing annual band of all the ways to end a Play School album in1972 is pretty epic. And the Lotte Kestner is from 2015. And then right at the end,we've got some more of the Hat Band from Lidsville from 1971. So anyway, I'll speak to you soon. RC 380: Alternate artwork

Tag: Rita Abrams

RC 380: PSYCH SCHOOL – Play School Breaks, Psych & Funk

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