A Jew And A Muslim Walk Into A Photo

Steeleye Span Live at the Main Point: GAUDETE

This is one of my favorite Christmas carols -- the Latin hymn GAUDETE (rejoice). Check out Steeleye Span -- a cappella, baby -- at the Main Point in December 1972. From a live radio concert remote broadcast I produced for WMMR. Merry Christmas!

This Is Dedicated To My UPenn Classmate, Donald Trump

Toon by Junco Canché. Based on a concept by me, Dennis Wilen, aka Comic Saenz

PREVIOUSLY ON DONALD TRUMP:

• Donald Trump claims he went to college with me, Dennis Wilen

Pumpkin Spice vs Spice (forgive me, Antonio Prohías)

Cheer if you agree

Those autumn leaves

Fractals Under Glass, a fractalicious Philip Glass-infused slideshow video

It's groovy! It's smoovy! Check out this five-minute musical slideshow of six dozen of my new fractals set to Philip Glass' 'Metamorphosis' as played by Mark Thomas. This is the first time I've used OSX app Photos (formerly iPhoto) to make a slideshow and it was surprisingly intuitive, easy and fun.

Posted by Dennis Wilen on Friday, October 16, 2015

 

It's groovy! It's smoovy! Check out this five-minute musical slideshow of six dozen of my new fractals set to Philip Glass' Metamorphosis as played by Mark Thomas.

This is the first time I've used OSX app Photos (formerly iPhoto) to make a slideshow and it was surprisingly intuitive, easy and fun.

Got to pay your dues if you want to sing the blues. And you know it don't come easy

Lavender Blue, Dilly Dilly. Lavender Green.

Sammy Turner explains:

What you see is what you see

Behold the Balloonicorn

Your future looks bright

A little birdy told me

Once upon a time there was a sorcerer who had an apprentice...

Oh look, it's Paisley Park

What's on the other side of the looking glass?

 

Did you ever wonder what was on the other side of the looking glass?

Mommy? Daddy? Where do faeries live?

When the sun goes down in the city, the faeries all fly home.

The Spice Must Flow

Found this magical worm lurking in the fractal universe, deep in the sand.

I found Angry Birds lurking in fractal space

I love it when I stumble across new and previously unknown and unseen "critters" in the imaginary mathematical world of fractals. I found these guys today.

I'm using Chaotica Free App. Hella deal!

I'd like to be, under the sea, in an octopus's garden in the shade

3 Amigos

I'm still having fun exploring the Chaotica fractal app. The fractal that this edited/enhanced image is based on took 47 minutes to generate, sucked half the juice out of my MacBook Air battery and got the laptop so hot that the fan came on.

Very rare. Definitely CPU intensive.

Still, I'm getting good results and learning how to control different parameters in the "worlds" I am exploring. Here's tonight's exploration.

How my version of 'Captain Jack' made Billy Joel a star

I spoke with Philadelphia Magazine's Victor Fiorillo two months ago about Billy Joel and me. His story is now online:

Billy Joel has released just one studio album in the past 20 years — a 2001 recording of his classical compositions that you’ve likely never heard. Yet when he takes the stage in Philadelphia on August 13th, he’ll do so at Citizens Bank Park in front of some 40,000 fans and play through his repertoire of modern American classics. He’s a true star, and one with a fiercely loyal following. But it wasn’t always that way.

Back in 1971, Joel was a no-name 22-year-old from Long Island. In November of that year, he released his first album, Cold Spring Harbor, which got virtually no attention or airplay.

Then one day in 1972, local music producer Dennis Wilen [photo], who had launched a live WMMR concert series from Philadelphia’s Sigma Sound Studios, got wind of Joel during a visit to New York and invited him to do a show.

Continued @ PhillyMag.com....

Ripples in the bands of time

Donald Trump explains his 'border wall with a door' proposal

And he dreamed of a ladder reaching up to Heaven

Genesis 28:12

And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven; and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it.

ויחלם והנה סלם מצב ארצה וראשו מגיע השמימה; והנה מלאכי אלהים עלים וירדים בו׃

Dear Huckabee: Welcome to Godwin's Law! Love, God

I endorse this message! – Boy Who Cried Wolf

Huckabee photo by DonkeyHotey. Hand by Michaelangelo. Dedicated to Mike Godwin.

This was the night I introduced Elvis Costello to Spinal Tap

Backstage at UCLA's Royce Hall for the Folksmen's June 1, 2001 gig at the Harry Smith Tribute Concert, I photographed Elvis Costello hanging out with my bud Beck. Later I took Elvis downstairs to Spinal Tap's dressing room and left them alone to get acquainted. (I was/am Tap's webmaster.)

Costello joined Spinal Tap/The Folksmen onstage later that year when the Back from the Dead Tour brought the world's loudest band to Carnegie Hall.

I knew my 2011 Donald Trump story 'had legs'

In April 2011, I was the editor of AOL's Brentwood Patch on Los Angeles' ritzy Westside. The next month I was fired for alleged "racism."

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

In April 2011, Donald Trump's "birther" noises reminded me that he had been in my class at the University of Pennsylvania, when I was managing editor of the student newspaper.

I wanted to know more about this loud-mouthed vulgarian, so I looked for his photo in our Class of 1968 college yearbook. Unlike me (yearbook photo), he wasn't there.

I asked Trump about it in an opinion piece for Patch:

Dear Donald Trump: Where Is Your College Yearbook Photo? 

The bouffant reality star and real estate flipper questions the President. Here's a question for Trump.

Although the story was popular, it never got as big as I had hoped. And I got fired a few weeks later, so I was not inclined to promote the URL.

In October 2012, I resurrected the question on POCHO, my Ñews y Satire site, but never heard back from Don.

Flash forward.

Earlier this week, The Donald was bragging about his success at Penn's Wharton School, contrasting it with Senator John McCain's Annapolis performance. One smart reporter wanted to learn more about the nominee wannabe's college career.

Nancy Dillon, L.A. Bureau Chief for the N.Y. Daily News, found my old story and asked me for comments.  I made the headline on Tuesday:

Donald Trump's UPenn classmates have 'no memory of him,' doubt his claims of being top in class

Talk show hosts Roe Conn and Anna Davlantes of WGN in Chicago were next.

Here's audio of my 8-minute Wednesday segment in which I called Trump "an enigma wrapped inside an enchilada."

And last night (Thursday) I was on NBC/Universal's ACCESS HOLLYWOOD with the 1968-vintage Penn yearbook, (photo by STACY) looking, fruitlessly, for Donald.

Click here for my brief appearance on the July 23 episode. I start at 1:55.

What have I learned this week?

• It's possible to be briefly famous in 2015 for NOT KNOWING SOMEONE in 1967-68
• I was right about that story. And it outlasted Brentwood Patch.

Introducing...FOX HEADROOM

Listen: Donald Trump Was My College Classmate, A True Story

Roe Conn and Anna Davlantes of WGN had me on their Chicago talk radio show today (7/22/2015) to discuss my University of Pennsylvania classmate Donald Trump, the mystery man of the Class of 1968.

He's "an enigma wrapped inside an enchilada," I explained.

NYDailyNews quotes me on self-proclaimed college BMOC Donald Trump: ‘No one remembers him’

Nancy Dillon of the New York Daily News interviewed me Tuesday about my University of Pennsylvania classmate Donald Trump:

“No one remembers him,” another former classmate, Dennis Wilen, said Tuesday.

Now a writer in California, Wilen was managing editor of the campus newspaper and said he only learned about Trump when the billionaire became famous in New York.

“I think he’s a racist blowhard,” Wilen said Tuesday. “And if you have to rely on something you did in the ’60s to validate what you’re saying today, you’ve lost your way.”

Nancy's story is here.

It's not easy

 

HEEBISH: a one-minute experimental groove (audio)

HEEBISH is a one-minute experimental groove created with the latest version of Garage Band.

'Scuse me while I kiss the sky

Kiss this guy.

NASA releases new Hubble satellite photo of Wookie Constellation

NASA releases new Hubble satellite photo of Wookie Constellation.

It's in the Si'Klaata Cluster.

New free HAMSA image fights evil eye

Use it, share it. You're welcome.

I'm going to call this fractal image RIFT

I'm think I'm going to call this fractal image RIFT. It's way catchier than the XML!

 

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He Lives!

Who knows where or venn?

Cactal

I'm back in the fractal again

An old friend recently inquired if I'd be interested in creating some fractal images for a video project. I was flattered, of course, but didn't know how to respond since I hadn't made/discovered any new fractals for at least 10 years. But I was intrigued enough to first download the old shareware I used when I was a fractalmaniac, Fractal Domains, enter ye olde serial number, and see if I still had any feel for the medium. I liked what I came up with enough to search for newer faster shinier software and I grabbed the freeware version of Chaotica. Here's the first image I generated.

NBC Dumps Trump

A man may work from sun to sun...

A man may work from sun to sun but a pocha's work is never done.

Quickie illustration by me for for POCHO.COM's Facebook page based on a WWII recruiting poster.

Leo Sayer Live at the Trenton War Memorial: COMPLETE

Leo Sayer live at the Trenton (New Jersey) War Memorial March 12, 1975. 

• Original 1975 recording produced for WMMR by me, Dennis Wilen. 
• Recorded by Lance Strickler and John Buffington of Mom's Wholesome Audio. 
• Tape preserved by Ted Cohen (7.5 ips half-track stereo original dub).
• Tape transferred to digital by Erik Flannigan. 
• Digital transfer equalized, compressed and remastered by Leo Sayer June 2015. 
• 2015 release produced by Dennis Wilen.

Here's what Leo wrote about this show:

It was 1975, and I was touring America for the 2nd time, this time without the pierrot costume, and starting to play bigger shows. 

Here we supported the Sensational Alex Harvey Band. 

My band were keyboardist Chris Stainton (already legendary for his work with Joe Coker and The Greaseband and Mad Dogs And Englishmen), Charlie Harrison on bass, Steve Chapman on drums and Les Nicol on guitar. 

We were a pretty tight outfit and 'Long Tall Glasses (I Can Dance)' was heading up the charts and bringing in a whole new audience to our shows, so I was on a roll when we recorded this. 

SAHB had been around the circuit a year before us so were well established and Alex was a fantastic showman on stage, and it was a thrill to be supporting them and playing to their crowd into the bargain. 

It must've been a great gig to attend 'cos both bands were well known to give more than 100% onstage at the time. 

The energy really comes across here, and though a lot of people wrote me off as MOR, this show belies that - we rocked! 

I'm older and wiser now maybe, but when I heard this tape back it's like yesterday again. 

Hope you all like it too...

TRACK LISTING:

1. Introduction by Michael Tearson of WMMR. 
2. Giving It All Away 
3. Oh What A Life 
4. Tomorrow 
5. In My Life 
6. Train 
7. One Man Band 
8. Telepath 
9. Another Time 
10. Long Tall Glasses 
11. Show Must Go On

Leo Sayer Live at the Trenton War Memorial: TOMORROW

 

Leo Sayer performs TOMORROW live at the Trenton War Memorial on March 12, 1975. Radio concert produced for WMMR by Dennis Wilen. After we found and digitized audio from this original tape, Leo himself re-mastered this track for your pleasure. Thanks, Leo! Leo just posted his "liner notes" on Facebook:

It was 1975, and I was touring America for the 2nd time, this time without the pierrot costume, and starting to play bigger shows. Here we supported the Sensational Alex Harvey Band. My band were keyboardist Chris Stainton (already legendary for his work with Joe Coker and The Greaseband and Mad Dogs And Englishmen), Charlie Harrison on bass, Steve Chapman on drums and Les Nicol on guitar. We were a pretty tight outfit and 'Long Tall Glasses (I Can Dance)' was heading up the charts and bringing in a whole new audience to our shows, so I was on a roll when we recorded this. SAHB had been around the circuit a year before us so were well established and Alex was a fantastic showman on stage, and it was a thrill to be supporting them and playing to their crowd into the bargain. It must've been a great gig to attend 'cos both bands were well known to give more than 100% onstage at the time. The energy really comes across here, and though a lot of people wrote me off as MOR, this show belies that - we rocked! I'm older and wiser now maybe, but when I heard this tape back it's like yesterday again. Hope you all like it too...

Leo Sayer live at the Trenton War Memorial: TELEPATH

 

Leo Sayer live at the Trenton War Memorial, March 12,1975. Produced for WMMR by Dennis Wilen. Sound by Mom's Wholesome Audio. Just digitized from that original reel-to-reel tape you see in the photo.

Leo Sayer Live at the Trenton War Memorial (intro)

 

WMMR's Michael Tearson introduces Leo Sayer at the Trenton (NJ) War Memorial concert hall on March 12. 1975. The concert was recorded and later broadcast on the station. Radio concert produced for WMMR by Dennis Wilen. Sound by Mom's Wholesome Audio.

Due to the earthquake in the area you are calling, your call cannot be completed at this time

 

Due to the earthquake in the area you are calling, your call cannot be completed at this time.

When I designed and built a website for Spinal Tap, it started out something like this...

Black. Very restful on the eyes.

Posted by Dennis Wilen on Sunday, May 31, 2015

 

You can see the original Flash file in action at ARCHIVE.ORG with Flash coding by Frank San Filippo.

Jackson Browne Live 1975: These Days

 

Jackson Browne and David Lindley perform These Days at the Main Point in Bryn Mawr, PA September 7, 1975. Produced for WMMR by Dennis Wilen.

SCHWA THE MOVIE: SPACE ALIENS ARE HERE NOW. AND IN CHARGE.

 

I re-imagined the 1990s underground art classic SCHWA World Operations Manual as a 16-minute video courtesy of the SCHWA guy, William Barker.

Based on a how-to corporate guide from SCHWA, the alien company that rules the Earth and all of us "stick people," the video highlights the methods this off-world conspiracy employs EVERY DAY to keep us as obedient servants of the Corporate Alien Overlords.

Excellent music courtesy Carvin Knowles.

Jackson Browne Live 1975: Jamaica Say You Will

 

Jackson Browne and David Lindley live at the Main Point in Bryn Mawr PA on September 7, 1972 with JAMAICA SAY YOU WILL. Produced and engineered for WMMR by Dennis Wilen.

Where to go, what to do on Mother's Day

BRUNCH: Nothing makes for a mellow mom like the All You Can Drink Micheladas Mother’s Day Brunch at stylish Bar Racho at the Ritchie Valens Hilton on East Olmos Boulevard.

Executive Jefe Gustaco Naranjero once again promises his extensive buffet featuring a soft and hard taco station, the always-popular Holy Habanero salsa challenge and the spectacular Flan Fountain.

New this year is the Fusion Fiesta featuring creations like the Banh Mi Burrito, the Tamales de Lox and the Philly Cheesesteak Chimichangas.

Don’t miss the free giveaway of the new mini Tapatio espray bottles for when you absolutely, positively need to spice stuff up.

 MUSIC: East Pocho Community College student radio K-POCHO FM 89.3 will be featuring a 24-hour Mother’s Day Music Marathon starting just after midnight Sunday morning, according to Program Director Queso Quesem.

“We’ve got a great bunch of artists lined up,” he said.

“We’ve got the Mamas and the Papas, the Mothers of Invention, Tracy Nelson and Mother Earth, Cat Mother and the All-Night Newsboys, Moms Mabley, Every Mother’s Son, the Mothership Connection, Mother Mother, Sweet Mother, Wolf Mother, Ask Your Mother, Blood Root Mother, Mother Goose, The Mothers, Mother Jones Band, Sweet Mother and Wire Mother. We’ll hear from Yer Mom Band, Hallie’s Mom’s Band and Stiflers Mom. Don’t miss La Mama, Big Mama, Mamaband, Mama Doni, Mama Kicks and Mama Digdown’s Brass Band. Hang in for Grandma, My Grandma and 3 Legged Grandma. And stay tuned for songs by the Greasy Granny Band, the Buranovo Grannies and the Grannies.”

CAR CLUB: The Little Old Ladies from Pasadena Car Club’s Annual Best of Barrio Beauty Show runs from 8 AM to 4 PM at the old drive-in movie parking lot behind Carlos Santana Charter High School.

Members of the all-abuelita organization will show off their custom ranflas, hoopties and bombas to the public. Cars compete in categories including nicest knit steering wheel cozies, Don’t You Make Me Come Back There rear seat customizing and Most Fabuloso Cadillac.

The $10 per car admission fee, organizers remind neighbors, does not include teenagers hiding in the trunk.

 Originally published @ POCHO.

AMERICA live at Sigma Sound: "A Horse With No Name"

 

AMERICA live at Sigma Sound Studios in Philadelphia, PA, February 1972. Gerry Beckley - vocals, guitars, bass; Dewey Bunnell - vocals, guitars; Dan Peek - vocals, guitars, bass, harmonica. Produced for WMMR by Dennis Wilen.

Jackson Browne Live 1975: Come All Ye Fair and Tender Ladies/Take It Easy

 

Jackson Browne (guitar) and David Lindley (fiddle) open the September 7, 1975 show at the Main Point in Bryn Mawr, PA with a medley of the traditional Come All Ye Fair and Tender Ladies and JB's hit Take It Easy. Live concert produced and engineered for WMMR by Dennis Wilen.

New from CRUZFOODZ: Canadchiladas

Jackson Browne Live 1975: Before the Deluge

 

Jackson Browne and David Lindley live at the Main Point, Bryn Mawr, PA, September 7, 1975. Live concert remote broadcast produced and engineered for WMMR by Dennis Wilen.

Steeleye Span Live 1972: Cam' Ye O'er Frae France?

 

Steeleye Span performs Cam Ye O'er Frae France? a song about the (failed) Jacobite Scottish Catholic rebellion against the Protestant throne and the war's loser, Bonnie Prince Charlie. Broadcast live in concert from the Main Point in Bryn Mawr PA and produced for WMMR by Dennis Wilen. December 1972.

Always rinse and sort your beans, and discard foreign objects

Jackson Browne Live at the Main Point: For Everyman

 

Jackson Browne and David Lindley perform For Everyman in a live show broadcast from the Main Point in Bryn Mawr, PA, September 7, 1975. Produced and engineered for WMMR by Dennis Wilen.

I'm not sure these plants originated on Earth