Harry Smith

Compiler of the "Folk and Blues Bible", remarkable experimental filmmaker, collector of Ukranian Easter Eggs (30,000), and owner of largest found paper airplane collection (eventually donated to the Smithsonian). Smith's films took years to make and required incredible organization as he would create them frame by frame and wait until they were finished to develop the work. I have a soft spot for his later films that are just saturated footage of friends and acquaintances shot around New York.

Southpaw Show October 17

Thanks to Chris La Putt for the photos. More here. And more at Brooklyn Vegan.

Have a Howling Good Time

Paul Lynde and Halloween. That's him dressed up as Frankenstein's monster. Some footage of his Halloween special can be seen here. Other Lynde stuff. And.

Staying Alive

October 28, 2008
Vital Signs
Prevention: Chest Compressions, to a Disco Beat
By ERIC NAGOURNEY

Well, you can tell by the way he pounds your chest, he’s an E.R. man, and his tempo is best.

That’s right — “Stayin’ Alive,” the song some people might pay to get out of their head, may be just what their heart needs if it suddenly stops.

Researchers say the Bee Gees song, from the 1977 hit movie “Saturday Night Fever,” offers almost the perfect pace for performing chest compressions on people who have had heart attacks. Emergency workers doing cardiopulmonary resuscitation are advised to press down on the chest 100 times a minute. “Stayin’ Alive” has 103 beats a minute.

The findings were presented at a recent conference of the American College of Emergency Physicians by Dr. David Matlock of the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria.

This is not to say that people would actually be forced to listen to the song.

“We’re not advocating turning on the song in the middle of a resuscitation,” Dr. Matlock said. “If it helps people to sing it out loud, I guess that’s O.K.”

For several years, Dr. Matlock said, emergency workers have been told that compressions done to the tempo of the song are more likely to conform to the recommendations of the American Heart Association. Doing it right can triple the survival rate, the researchers said. But no one had proved that the song actually helped.

For the study, researchers had 10 doctors and 5 medical students practice compressions while listening to the music. When they were retested five weeks later without the song, they did the compressions at an average rate of 113 a minute, within the acceptable range.

“Stayin’ Alive,” by the way, is not the only song found to be helpful. “Another One Bites the Dust,” by Queen, may also work.

“Obviously,” Dr. Matlock said, “ ‘Stayin’ Alive’s a little more appropriate for the situation.”

The Terrorific TENEBRAE!

Bill Withers "Use Me" featuring James Gadson

The Parker

I stayed here over the weekend. Gene Autry used to own it, then Merv Griffin. Jonathan Adler did the modern interior design and it's tremendous.

The Parker

The Parker in Palm Springs

Pointer Sisters "Yes We Can Can" featuring Gaylord Birch

You'll Disappear at 105 Riv

By Chris Talbott at silenfivemedia.com

Show at Southpaw Brooklyn

Performance before Menahan Street Band. Tickets here.