(020801) Site du Jour of the Day Special Announcement

Readers,

Since February of 1997 Site du Jour of the Day episodes have been going out to subscribers of the e-mail version on pretty much a daily basis. At last count there were almost 1,750 episodes. Some were duplicates, but most have been fresh. Now because of commitments I have to a couple of other big projects, Site du Jour of the Day episodes will no longer be sent out every day. The plan is to keep the episodes and project going but with a message only once a week. Site du Jour of the Day once a Week is a silly name but for now that's what it'll be.

Everything here is fantastic and everybody is fine, it's just that things for me are busier than ever before and something had to give. For those who are concerned about losing Site du Jour of the Day, the new format should ring true to what you've come to enjoy about the project. It'll just be at a different frequency. Daily episodes could very well return before too long. We'll just have to wait and see. (Back to top of page)

(020807) EelPie.com
http://www.eelpie.com/

Petetownshend.com
http://www.petetownshend.com/
http://www.petetownshend.co.uk/

Eel Pie Recording Productions Limited
Richmond, England

As you may or may not know, Site du Jour of the Day episodes are currently being sent out once a week. This is the first of the series in the new format and as things settle out it's bound to change a little here and a little there.

With some of the extra time afforded by the new schedule, I was finally able to have a look at the extensive retail site that is EelPie.com. Founded as a commercial venture in 1970 by Pete Townshend, probably best known for his work with the Loudest Band in the World, The Who. Available at EelPie.com are quite a few sound recordings, available both for purchase and downloading. Suggested for all casual or better Pete Townshend or Who fans is the recently released Pete Townshend Sccoped collection. Combining material from the three earlier volumes of Scoop, this two disc set covers nearly forty years of home recordings and early studio gems. Referred to as "demos," the recordings offer a glimpse at the inner workings of Pete Townshend's music. Quite raw in some cases and better than ready in others, more than a few of the tracks on Scooped or any of the three original Scoop packages are more interesting than the more popular version of the same songs. Be sure to check out the Media section for those downloads.

Relaunched just a few weeks ago, Petetownshend.com takes a different look at Pete Townshend and The Who than that at EelPie.com. Biographical information, news, Pete's Diaries, and more. There are probably a dozen or so Pete Townshend fan sites worth looking at, but these two sites are the real deal. Bonus points to the gang for still releasing projects on vinyl. (Back to top of page)

(020814) The Doghaus Collection.Elvis
http://www.doghaus.com/

E-Films
Berkeley, California, USA

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Disgraceland: A Tim-Elvis Experience!
http://www.nwlink.com/~timelvis/

Tim-Elvis
A-HUNKA-HUNKA BURNIN-LUV & CO
Stone Circle Communications
Bellevue, Washington, USA

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Holiday Rambler on the WWW
http://www.holidayrambler.com/

Holiday Rambler Recreational Vehicle
Monaco Coach Corporation
Coburg, Oregon, USA

In case you have been trapped in a well or something and have missed it, two days from today is the twenty-fifth anniversary of Elvis' death.

Right up to the day that Elvis Presley died I never paid much attention to his career. By the time I was old enough for records to catch my ear the Beatles were all but done, and the industry had moved on to other things. The comic King who had inadvertently changed the way the Columbia Broadcasting System sent the Ed Sullivan Show out on Sunday nights with his swinging pelvis, and broke a million hearts by joining the United States Army was a now fat, tired, parody of his former glory. It sure did beat driving a truck though.

My interest in the career of Elvis A. Presley started that sixteenth day of August back in 1977. For several days a group of friends and I had planned on staying up all night in Wally Malkowski's Grandparent's Holiday Rambler trailer that was parked behind his house. This was the case every summer, once or twice a month we would stay up all night doing the things that school kids do. The trailer was eventually hauled down to Florida when it started to get too cold for Wally's grandparents, but was ours all summer long.

The sun was, as Elvis Costello once sang "like a light bulb being swallowed by a clown," and we were getting ready to dig in for the night. Just as Wally opened the door to the Holiday Rambler his Mother came out of the house crying. "Walter" she said through heavy tears, "you and the boys are not going to be able to sleep out here tonight — Elvis is dead."

Mrs. Malkowski is probably still a rabid Elvis fan and even as kids we knew not to question the seriousness of her reaction to the news. What we didn't know is that our lives had been changed forever that night. The emotion we experienced was more than the disappointment from breaking up what would have turned out to be our last back yard camping trip, it was a certain sense of respect for the mother of our friend. How the death of a washed-up singer affected her so deeply, it was something that seemed very odd to me at the time and was crucial in developing my own appreciation of the King of Rock and Roll.

I couldn't have cared less about him at the time, but during the past twenty-five years I have grown to enjoy the part of our national culture known as the Dead Elvis. It is different than the appreciation some fans have for the man who became a legend. It's more about the legend than the man, and the influence the legend has had on society. For a superb look at this phenomenon one should seek out Dead Elvis — a Chronicle of a Cultural Obsession by Greil Marcus, Doubleday, New York, 1991, ISBN 0-385-41718-7 and/or The King Is Dead — Tales of Elvis Postmortem edited by Paul M. Sammon, Delta, New York, 1994, ISBN 0-385-31253-9.

These two sites explore the life and afterlife of Col. Tom's sneering puppet. Both take a long hard look at everything Elvis and would not be the splendor that they are if the King were still alive, reduced to playing the Oldies circuit out in Las Vegas or touring to places like Fort Myers, Florida. When visiting these sites be prepared to experience buckets full of tasteless images and parody plus pointers galore. If you are running a Windows compatible machine, downloading the desktop utility called Tiny Elvis (http://www.zdnet.de/download/library/deATH-wc.htm) is an absolute must. Similar to a bit on Saturday Night Live (http://snltranscripts.jt.org/92/92aelvis.phtml) (SdJotD 020327) a few years ago where a miniature Elvis rode on the dashboard of a car through the miracle of blue screen photography, commenting on how big things were Tiny Elvis sits on your desktop until you trigger a reaction out of him... "Damn, look at the size of that cursor, it's huuuge!"

When August 16th comes around, wade through the hype and keep your personal vision of Elvis in your mind. Try to imagine a world that is completely void of the influence of Elvis and then perhaps be thankful he was here. I might very well be so thankful that I'll sleep outside that night.

For more on this subject, see ELVIS is still #1 (http://www.KarenDerr.com/elvis) (SdJotD 970808), Elvis at the FBI Freedom of Information Act Electronic Reading Room (http://foia.fbi.gov/presley.htm) (SdJotD 000318), Elvis at the Louisiana Hayride. Excerpted from the book Something In The Water by Frank Page with Joey Kent (http://www.rockabillyhall.com/ElvisHayride.html) (SdJotD 000816), and Elvis' Women -- in the movies, that is (http://greggers.granitecity.com/elvis/women/) (SdJotD 020424).

Elvis, Elvis Presley and Graceland remain registered trademarks of Elvis Presley Enterprises, Inc. (EPE) and thanks to RCA and BMG we can still get pieces of the pie. The King is gone but he's not forgotten. (Back to top of page)

(020821) Home Theater Magazine
http://www.hometheatermag.com/

PRIMEDIA Inc.
New York, New York, USA

It's a revolution that hasn't gone completely ignored by consumers here in the USA. High Definition Television, or HDTV tops the list of new products and technologies that will soon be in homes across the country and around the world. Only trouble is, a new technology can take years to become a standard. Learning about such things can be a daunting task — most of the information available is manufacturer or industry organization propaganda and rounding up the best advice is often difficult chore. There are sites that offer practical comparisons and some that speak to the propeller head in all of us. Finding the right balance between technological wonder and sound shopping is tough. Take Betamax (http://www.urbanlegends.com/products/beta_vs_vhs.html) for example, still a much better product in many cases but long dead on the home electronics front. Competing standards and formats often confuse the issue, as was the case with Sony's Betamax. Do you remember the Laser Disc format or the analog Video Disk format? How about the excitement of looking at a show on a color television for the first time or when a television remote control made a lot of noise when you told him or her to change the channel and move the antennae until the picture was right?

For those who have some catching up to do, or already know a bit about the new technologies which have been combined into something known as Home Theater, this site will be an informative visit. Home Theater now includes amazing quality and performance in the areas of picture and sound. Units that will play a number of formats, pull digital television signals off of a cable or out of thin air, even receive television and radio programming from satellites. Even in the car!

The site for Home Theater Magazine has something for every level of interest and expertise, tutorials and the glossary make it worth a visit. Content looks at all sorts of things including DVD players, HDTV Tuners, Receivers, Power Amplifiers, and Loudspeakers. Adding pointers to related Do It Yourself sites is a nice touch. (Back to top of page)

(020821) Live Lightning/2000™
http://www.aninoquisi.com/live_lightning.htm

Aninoquisi Software Design
Huntland, Tennessee, USA

The target market for Aninoquisi Software Design (http://www.aninoquisi.com/) is likely those who have a use for commercial weather applications or high-end hobby equipment. One such product is Lightning/2000™ and this page at the Aninoquisi Software Design site is actually a portal to other sites using the package. The highest concentration of lightning reports here are currently in the continental US, but there are sites from around the world. For entertainment purposes only and not for protection of life or property, it's amazing how many thunderstorms are cooking at any given moment. Each site has a different feel to it and that adds to the adventure of visiting. For an active look most days this time of year, see Florida Media Communications' LIVE Lightning Tracker - Real-Time Lightning Detector - 300 mile radius From Tampa Florida (http://www.flamedia.com/lightning/light.htm) (SdJotD 010904). If you see activity at Fort Myers (south of Tampa), have a peek at Waterman Broadcasting Corporation's First Alert Doppler Radar (http://www.nbc-2.com/Weather/). We see a lot of lightning. (Back to top of page)

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Copyright 2002, Edward J. Pelegrino. All rights reserved.
Harpo, Trade and Service Marks used herein are the property of their respective owners.

https://members.tripod.com/~SdJotD/2002/0208.htm

Updated August 28, 2002