So this happened all the time, even though we like to pretend it didn’t.
In Britain! I meant to say it happened all the time in Britain!
We were way cooler over here in America…
This happened three years after that video. Why is it weird his legs are on top?
When I was a kid (and maybe still now), I prided myself on knowing the words to many, many toy commercials.
Somehow, this one escaped me.
No matter what, Charger-Tron, you will not escape me again!
(SIDENOTE: This is YouTube gold. Thank you to zorro3121 for sharing this with the world.)
This is a weird situation for me. I consider myself fairly savvy about 80’s pop culture. I can pull nuggets of recollections (drunken or otherwise) that would put search engines to shame.
For instance, after all these years, how can I still remember the theme song to a show that ran 28 years ago for thirteen episodes:
Equally as strange as knowing the lyrics to Pole Position is knowing (most) of the words to Punky Brewster’s cartoon theme:
But this is where I dropped the ball. I saw some write-up about 80’s cartoons, and the show Turbo Teen was mentioned. I DON’T REMEMBER TURBO TEEN. That is until I saw this:
*hangs head in shame*
SIDENOTE: If you type Turbo Teen in Google, you get no results.
Because it sounds dirty.
Who am I kidding? These are both great. So it’s an Awesome Battle that ends in total win!
(SIDENOTE: I miss you, Everything is Terrible… I promise not stay away so long ever again!)
THINGS TO WATCH FOR:
This series of posts imagine “what if I had a blog back then?” I originally was not ever going to use YouTube videos if the post took place before the site’s inception, but– it’s my blog, so I can change my own rules. You could presuppose that if there was a forum to blog within back in 1981, there would have been a version of YouTube… and I would have been six years old…
It reminds me of CBS' Special Presentation logo.
According to the dictionary, Magnavox translates to “great voice” in Latin. I think it should translate into “great products.” First, they invented home video game machines, with the Odyssey. Then they came out with neato-peato 19-inch color TV’s. Then they made the Odyssey 2!
I can’t wait for their newest product… the Laser Disc. They look like shiny records, or something that Spock would have played Frisbee with on Star Trek. That’s probably why they use Actor! Leonard Nimoy in the commercials. Since he went off In Search Of new technologies, he probably never thought he’d be stopping at one place. And that one place is MAGNAVOX!
If this is just a small sign of the wonders they can accomplish, they will be industry leaders for years – and decades – to come!
REFERENCES:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SCeTpWzpys&h=300&w=400]
This kind of reminds me of Magnavox's logo.
Remakes are hardly better.
With all the remakes leaking out of Hollywood like – oh, I don’t know – an unstoppable oil spill, I started thinking about song remakes… how they don’t happen as often, and when they do, how they tend to be worthy updates or at least interesting spins (outdated pun!) on the original.
That’s when I decided to present a So, Duh! Pop Quiz that will have you match a song remake with a comparable film remake.
1) Anberlin’s version of New Order’s True Faith
2) Cake’s version of Gloria Gaynor’s I Will Survive
3) Eddie Vedder’s version of Indio’s Hard Sun
4) Flo Rida’s version of Dead or Alive’s You Spin Me Round (called Right Round)
5) Shinedown’s version of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Simple Man
BONUS: To check out My Top Ten List of 80’s (Music) Remakes, click here.
(Answers… or opinions, I guess… after the jump…) Read More
Can you be nostalgic for venereal disease commercials?
Yes, you can be nostalgic for venereal disease commercials.
Comments Round 1
VD is for everyone, eh? Let’s run with that…
Comments Round 2
Holy crap! We’ve been busy at work, so my boss/friend Paul has been unable to make a new list, despite my pestering and bugging. So in honor of the “Holy Crapness” of this event, allow me to present:
Top 5 Subtle Christian-Approved Songs of the 80’s
5) Maneater – Hall & Oates
Sample Line: “Watch out boy, she’ll chew you up!”
Christian-Approved Message: You couldn’t get anymore anti-oral sex than this song. Missionary only, please. (After marriage, of course…)
4) Keep Your Hands to Yourself – The Georgia Satellites
Sample Line: “No huggin’, no kissin’, until you make me your wife.”
Christian-Approved Message: This song should appeal to the abstinence-only crowd (hello, Jonas Brothers), as well as explain the shotgun weddings found often in the South (hello, Miley Cyrus).
3) We Don’t Have to Take Our Clothes Off – Jermaine Stewart
Sample Line: (see title)
Christian-Approved Message: Another abstinence-only song. Girls are throwing themselves at him, and he is telling them, “No thanks, let’s just dance and drink some cherry wine.” He’s either very religious, or very gay… or both. (There might be openings at the monastery.)
2) Papa Don’t Preach – Madonna
Sample Line: “I’m gonna keep my baby… mmm…”
Christian-Approved Message: While the fact that Madonna is singing about getting knocked up out of wedlock might not sit well with the religious right, the fact that she is going to keep my her baby and get married to the boyfriend has to appeal to the pro-life movement. (And the messages of songs #3 and #4…)
1) You Shook Me All Night Long – AC/DC
Sample Line: “Yeah you… shook me… all… night… long.”
Christian-Approved Message: Unbeknowest to most people, this song is actually about a female demon that is exorcised. (Or is it exercised?)
Whom I always thought "Maneater" was about...
Usually, when I’m web surfing, I’m channel surfing. I needed to state that so you can understand why stumbling across these two discoveries blew. my. mind.
It may not be fair to say these beloved sitcoms were Just Shitty, and through the powers of the TripleDoubleU (and outstanding do-gooders uploading to YouTube), they magically became The Shit. I’m merely pointing out that the, um, points of contention these two videos address were Just Shitty moments from the original programs.
Who out there really thought the closing theme from Frasier was The Shit? Maybe Skittle Man, but I’d venture to guess not too many others. But if you slap it up, flip it, rub it down, you get this:
Likewise, The Wonder Years focused heavily on voice over work, courtesy of Home Alone baddie, Daniel Stern. Narration is perceived as a big, lazy, no-no in screenwriting, so imagine how ahead of the curb the 80’s classic would have been if Danny Stern had been left out of the equation. (It’d be tantamount to The Hills, only without the pop music filler…)
I’ve seen a few horror films that have creeped me out, and one documentary that reduced me to a shambled mess, but this may the first documentary that gives me the heebie-jeebies (I had it once already as a kid, but I’ve heard you can catch it again, unlike chicken pox, but very much like cooties.)
I dare you to watch the entire preview. In fact, you must watch the entire preview.
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