Marianne Faithfull and David Bowie performing ‘I Got You Babe’ at London’s Marquee in 1973. This was filmed for American TV show The Midnight Special and was Bowie’s last appearance as Ziggy Stardust.

Faithfull’s nun habit created a bit of a scandal when the show was aired. Her other habit, heroin, may explain her somewhat disengaged performance that night.

From the Ziggy Stardust Companion:

The last song - “I Got You Babe” was a duet sung with Marianne Faithful and was filmed at about 10pm at night.  Bowie warned the audience - “This isn’t anything very serious.  Its just a bit of fun - we’ve hardly even rehearsed it.”  Bowie’s costume for this song was the bright red PVC corset, PVC thigh-length stiletto boots and two black chest-hugging feathers (he was The Angel of Death), while Marianne Faithful was dressed as a decadent nun with cowl and a black backless cape, which left her bottom exposed to the audience as she quickly ran off stage at the end of the performance. 

In the outtake footage that appears in the second half of the following clip, you can see, for a brief moment, that Marianne indeed was wearing nothing underneath her costume.

 
The Bubble Baba challenge is the world’s only blow-up doll rafting race. It takes place every year in Russia. Here’s some footage from this year’s event. I love the point of view shot from the contestant’s perspective; the doll straining to achieve victory.

From the looks of the photograph it’s a unisexual blow-up doll event. I wonder what kind of problems a fully inflated plastic cock could cause in a situation like this? Position must be very important.
 

 
Thank you Violet Blue

 
Joe Meek was a brilliant, innovative and influential British record producer whose short life was filled with bizarre and ultimately tragic drama.

Meek produced several hit records in the 1960s and was often referred to as the English Phil Spector. His experimentation with electronic effects, including reverb, echo, distortion, compression, close-up miking, filters and multi-tracking, resulted in the distinctive “Meek sound.” Telestar Telstar, a spacy instrumental by The Tornadoes was his biggest hit and still sounds as excitingly fresh as it did 50 years ago. His other big international smash (and a personal favorite of mine) was the hard driving, percussive Have I The Right by The Honeycombs. The rhythm track of the song was augmented by Meek using a bunch of microphones clipped to banisters while the band stomped it’s feet on the recording studio stairs and beat a tambourine directly into a microphone.

Sadly, like Spector, Meek’s life became a tabloid nightmare that has to a great degree overshadowed his musical legacy.

Meek was gay at a time when being gay was illegal in the United Kingdom. His sexuality was the source of extreme mental conflict for Meek, he actually thought he could be cured of his homosexuality. Fear of incrimination pushed him into an increasing sense of isolation. Perhaps in an effort to seek some kind of cosmic sexual healing, he became obsessed with magic, the occult, extraterrestrials, and conspiracies of all sorts. He claimed to communicate with the ghost of Buddy Holly via ouija board and in seances. He reputedly placed microphones in graveyards to record the voices of the dead.

After a series of devastating personal and financial catastophes, Meek eventually became a paranoid recluse. His life ended at the young age of 37 in murder and suicide.

Joe Meek’s brief ascension into the heavens of pop stardom and crushing descent into a hell of circumstance and social pressure, as well as one of his own making, is a story as compelling and offbeat as any in the annals of rock and roll’s dark side. This hour long documentary tells that story in riveting fashion while also providing fascinating insight to his particular musical genius. The Very Strange Story of The Legendary Joe Meek.
 

 
The latest masterpiece by the true genius of the form, StSanders. This guy’s videos are a well known phenom for good reason and he keeps getting better. Total hilarity and it only improves with multiple viewings.

 
The Ladybirds (also Ladybyrds) hailed from New Jersey in the mid-1960’s and were notorious for performing topless. Their nude shows got them into trouble in Jersey so they moved west and started gigging in Las Vegas and Hollywood’s infamous Blue Bunny Club. They got some international exposure (pun intended) when they appeared in the movie The Wild, Wild World Of Jayne Mansfield.

While they made their rep by being “the world’s first and only all-girl topless band”, they were actually decent (or indecent) musicians. They could play!
 

 
more topless pop after the jump…

 
Dr. Phero is a skit from the defunct Japanese variety show “Vermilion Pleasure Night.” The entire series is available on DVD from Amazon. It is totally weird fun.
 

 
I could fake it and pretend I have some culturally significant insight about this video, but I don’t. It’s mod and sexy, it’s black and white and Barbi Benton is in it. Shot in 1970. Dig?
 

 
Serge Gainsbourg and Jerry Lee Lewis rhapsodizing about women and fucking in Bourges, France, 1987. Raw video footage shot for French TV but never broadcast for obvious reasons. This is epic.
 

 
For readers lucky enough to live in Los Angeles, this weekend there promises to be a pretty fabulous terrible event in the form of the Everything Is Festival! sponsored by the very wonderful people at the Cinefamily organization and the Everything is Terrible! video terrorists. Dangerous Minds will be attending so please say “Hi” and offer us free drugs:

Imagine a weekend where all your fantasies come true.  A weekend where you can just be…free.  Laugh until your sides literally split open, and feel as cool as a skateboarding, shade-tippin’ dog.  We’re talking about the festival to end all film festivals—Everything Is Festival! (aka the 10th Annual Gathering Of The Terribles)!  For reasons beyond our control (God’s plan), we at Cinefamily are giving the found footage freaks at Everything Is Terrible! free range of the weekend, and letting them do whatever the hell they want (note: we did have to say “no” to the all-night helicopter foam party).  This makes it the official L.A. premiere of their latest mash-up feature-length film, 2Everything 2Terrible 2: Tokyo Drift, not to mention some of EIT!’s favorite movies in their uncut glory, plus dance parties, BBQs, a return of the Cinefamily Found Footage Battle Royal, and top-secret über-rare prints from the vaults of Cinefamily and Austin, TX’s famous Alamo Drafthouse! For more info on becoming a contestant in the Found Footage Battle Royale, click here!

Sounds pretty good terrible, doesn’t it?

More from Everything is Terrible! This clip is especially terrible.
 

 
From Shan Nicholson, director of Downtown Calling, comes this new documentary on New York City gangs called Rubble Kings.

From 1968 to 1975, gangs ruled New York City. Beyond the idealistic hopes of the civil rightsnmovement lay a unfocused rage. Neither law enforcement nor social agency could end the escalating bloodshed. Peace came only through the most unlikely and courageous of events that would change the world for generations to come by giving birth to hip-hop culture.

 
Via Stupefaction

 
Another tasty Jim Steranko cover, this one from Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.‘s second issue, published in July 1968. The title is charming: “So Shall Ye Reap Death!”

From Charles Johnson’s Lizard collection over at Little Green Footballs.

 
From an ad on Craigslist. I appreciate that these Republicans are at least self-aware enough to add that this is for Jersey Shore lookalikes who “wouldn’t mind coming to a Republican party.” No pay, but free booze. Something tells me that most people who fancy themselves a ringer for the Situation or Snookie, free booze is probably pay enough…

We are looking for people who look like cast members of the jersey shore and whom wouldn’t mind coming to a republican party. We want basically anyone who even remotely resembles a cast member of the Jersey Shore, or who would not mind dressing up like a cast member of the show to come to our party. We want everyone to fill at least one role. Snookie, Situation etc. Send a pic with your response and your phone number. If you decide to attend we will cover your drinks and etc for the party. It’s not a big party, just a little get together very casual. It’s for a college club. Send an email if you are willing to show up to our party posing as one of these people (Anyones welcome, even if it’s a long shot to the way you look). Just send your number so we can call and talk about arrangements. Anyone looking to have some fun should apply!

On the other hand, Democrats who look like the IQ-challenged Guido and Guidette cast-members, might want to consider showing up in Jersey Shore drag, drinking all their Republican booze and puking all over the place. It would be more in character, anyways, don’t cha think?
 

 
Truly one of the most ravishing and mindblowing songs ever recorded: epic, beautiful, cinematic. Hearing it for the first time in 1967 was one of the lifechanging events in my life as a young rock and roller. ‘A Day In The Life’ altered my sense of what a rock song could be, it expanded the scope and vision of rock and roll in the way that Walt Whitman enlarged poetry, it opened the field for future artists to experiment on a new scale of creative imagination that was fresh to the form. The extraordinary Pet Sounds had preceded it by a year. But, as groundbreaking as Brian Wilson’s masterpiece was, The Beatles took things to the next level (argue amongst yourselves).

Released both in stereo and mono as a track on Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, here’s the 2009 stereo remaster of ‘A Day In The Life.’

The video is cool too.
 

 
When I posted here in March about Zak Smith’s blog, Playing D&D with Pornstars, it was a merely a popular blog, but now it’s a Internet video series called I Hit It With My Axe, with a couple dozen episodes released so far. In the below clip you will witness Sasha Grey, Kimberly Kane, Mandy Morbid, Satine Phoenix and others, including Smith himself, participating in the favorite hobby of geeks everywhere. (Er, maybe their second favorite pastime, I guess, but this sort of incorporates both interests, doesn’t it?)
 

 
See all episodes of I Hit It With My Axe (The Escapist)

 
As part of their promotional push for Robert Rodriguez’s controversial exploitation flick Machete, 20th Century Fox commissioned filmmakers to do ‘lifestyle’ videos of the folks involved with making the movie. This first one, directed by Estevan Oriol from SA Studios, features perennial badass Danny Trefo lowriding in East L.A.. with his buddy Mr. Cartoon.

Rodriguez knocked me out with his zombie gorefest Planet Terror, so I have high hopes for Machete. Trejo as a ridiculously over-armed desperado looks like my kind of hero, Billy Jack on steroids.