The years of sand and speed

Coop has a wonderful post featuring scans of Veda Orr's Hot Rod Pictorial, a late-'40s yearbook of the dawn of SCTA land speed racing. Orr was a fascinating woman--the first woman dry lakes racer, the first hot rod journalist (she wrote and edited for the SCTA's newsletter before the outbreak of WWII, and even put a couple of issues together during the war as a morale booster for the boys overseas)--and the period between the mid-1930s and late-1940s was a hugely influential one in terms of the look and technology of the traditional hot rod. Well worth a look.

I find your lack of funk disturbing

A glimpse at how things might have been, had Darth Vader been more of a streetwise soul brother, voiced by let's say James Earl Jones, rather than an athsmatic evil overlord, voiced by James Earl Jones:



[via Apropos of Something]

Sixteen men on a dead man's chest, and I been drinkin' from a broken cup

Tom Waits has to rank as one of my favourite artists of all time these days. His music ranges from heartbreaking jazz and country ballads, to rowdy blues-rock, to gonzo oddball circus-freak dances, to things that sound like a crime scene from a Raymond Chandler novel. Need Coffee (a sentiment I heartily agree with) has a killer, almost-all-inclusive roundup of Tom Waits' videos: Part One, Part Two.

And here's a couple more:

"God's Away on Business"


Probably his best-known song, "Downtown Train". You've probably heard the Rod Stewart version; Waits' original is pretty much note-for-note identical, but somehow sounds fatalistic instead of sentimental. Go figure.

Tourists of the world, unite!

Check out these e-cards from the Museum of Communism in Prague. Come for the amusing Stalinist kitsch, stay for the chilling reminders of how well-intentioned radical ideology turns into a worse system of repression than what it was supposed to replace.

Extra irony points for using the local McDonald's as a landmark to find the place.

[via adfreak]

Flight of the Kiwi

How a farmer in New Zealand built and flew an airplane nine months before the Wright Brothers.

Go fast, turn left

Before "stock cars" meant rolling billboards with multi-million dollar budgets that bear no resemblance to the cars they supposedly represent, the American midwest was full of dirt ovals, where local daredevils would brave bodily harm in stripped down, homebrewed specials. Hotrods & Roadsters of Central Kansas offers a glimpse into this bygone era.

Found on the HAMB, alongside this video:

Honk if you're horn-y, or "The Best Ever Death Metal Blog Post out of Crossfield"

See, I could be like every other smart-assed blogger in the Nine Circles of Bloghenna (or Bloggatory or Hades 2.0 or whatever they're calling it these days) and celebrate National Day of Slayer with some sort of curse-ory link to the NDOS website or something. It turns out, though, that the Dark Lord is everywhere you least expect him. Here's a brief Who's Who of the infernal servants of evil:

• Catholics. I mean, you knew the Pope had to be in league with something to pull off that hat, right? Confidential to J.R. of Vatican City: Next time, try a snappy fedora. No one will suspect a thing!


• Protestants. I guess it takes one to know one.


• The Jews. I mean, sure they invented the bagel--and have frickin' awesome hats--but any religion that requires you to skip the bacon and the cheese on your clubhouse? Get thee behind me!


• Okay, the usual suspects--Ozzy, Slayer, Marilyn Manson, etc., are a given. But did you know of the evil that lurks within REO Speedwagon? Or Amy Grant? I read it on the Internet, it must be true!


• The US Government. Wait a second, there's nothing to mock here...

Spot any more? Leave 'em in the comments box.