Wednesday, April 08, 2020

At Sleepy Joe's Café - Film Treasures, Streaming Courtesy of the Library of Congress

Excellence is to do a common thing in an uncommon way.
— Booker T. Washington, born  in 1856

There's a place out on the highway 'cross the San Bernardino line
Where the truckers and the bikers gather every night at the same time
At seven the band comes in and locals dance the night away
At Sleepy Joe's Café
I drive on down from the big town Friday when the clock strikes five
As the red sun sets in the ocean
I start to come alive

Summer girls in the parking lot slap on their makeup and they flirt the night away
At Sleepy Joe's Café
Joe came home in '45 and took out a G.I. loan
On a sleepy little spot and Army cook could call his own

He married Mary, the highway come in and they woke up to find
They were sitting on top of a pretty little gold mine
Saturday night the lights are bright as the folks pour in from town
Joe keeps the blues playin', at the bar Mary lays the beers down

I come through the door and feel the workweek slip away
See you out on the floor and Monday morning's a million miles away
At Sleepy Joe's Café
At Sleepy Joe's Café



Online Music Streaming Is Up 32 Percent


The two leading platforms are Spotify with 35 percent and Apple Music, with 19 percent. Amazon Music is third with 15 percent of market share. Paid subscriptions represented 80 percent of total revenue, with advertising and brand partnerships rounding out the remaining 20 percent. – Ludwig Van
Germany suspends 'beer taxes' amid coronavirus crisis



 Thank god for the internet. “I was 12 the first time I logged onto whatever was called the internet then. There were no websites to speak of, not really. No ecommerce, no banner ads, no data tracking, no spyware. iPhones hadn’t been invented yet; we called apps ‘programs’; and I had an EGA monitor on my PC (a whole 16 colors of range). But the first time I telnetted into a chatroom about raves, made new friends in Australia, or downloaded files to load into a music tracker, I felt the same elation that I feel now. This force, propelled by people, connected by copper and light, letting us make new connections. Connections we need now more than ever.”

The Building Empire turbos do not have clothes anymore not even pyjamas ...  
There’s a new White House press secretary, but does it even matter? 


Ahead of Parliament sitting today, artists and industry leaders launched a campaign calling for sector-specific support measures to avert collapse.

 
 
A personality quiz that will tell you which fictional characters you most resemble. This got me pretty well: Sam Tarly from GoT and MCU's Bruce Banner. Lisa Simpson, Lester Freamon, and C-3PO all in my top 25.


During the month of April, HBO is streaming dozens of shows, documentaries & movies for free via HBO GO & HBO NOW. Shows include The Wire (my personal fave), Succession, VEEP, The Sopranos, True Blood, Six Feet Under, and Silicon Valley. HBO usually offers a few things outside their paywall, but never anything this extensive

Film Treasures, Streaming Courtesy of the Library of Congress - The New York Times – The astonishment of riches includes up-close looks at our history in hundreds of films. And they’re all free. “…The biggest library in the world, it has an extraordinary trove of online  offerings — more than 7,000 videos — that includes hundreds of old (and really old) movies. With one click, you can watch Buffalo Bill’s Wild West showparade down Fifth Avenue in 1902; click again to giggle at Krazy Kat and Ignatz Mouse in a 1916 cartoon. And while the library is temporarily closed to the public, its virtual doors remain open. It remains one of my favorite places to get lost in… The aesthetic quality of the titles varies, but that’s to the point of the library’s democratic mandate. Not all the films on deposit are exemplars of the art — although greatness abounds here — but they nevertheless have cultural and historical value. Some are flat-out weird and wonderful, while others seem like souvenirs from a distant land. That’s true of “Television,” a 1939 curio that opens with an audience seated in the dark before a tiny glowing screen that abruptly grows larger, a stark encapsulation of TV’s challenge to moviegoing. “Television now takes its place,” the narrator promises (threatens!), “as a new American art and industry.”
One of the library’s best YouTube playlists gathers together a small selection of titles from the National Film Registry. The registry is part of the library and new titles are added to it annually with the help of the National Film Preservation Board, an advisory body. The library also invites the public to nominate titles for the registry, so if you’d like to endorse Robert Aldrich’s 1964 freakout “Hush … Hush, Sweet Charlotte” you have until Sept. 15. To be eligible, a movie must be at least 10 years (so hold off on nominating “The Last Jedi”) and be “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.”…”

A recording of a live performance of Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s play Fleabag (on which the TV show is based) is going to be streamed online to raise money for those affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Said Waller-Bridge:
I hope this filmed performance of Fleabag can help raise money while providing a little theatrical entertainment in these isolated times. Thank you to all our partners and to the creative team who have waived their royalties from this production to raise money for such vital causes in this unbelievably challenging situation. All money raised will support the people throughout our society who are fighting for us on the frontlines and those financially devastated by the crisis, including those in the theatre community. Thank you in advance to those who donate. Now go get into bed with Fleabag! It’s for charity!
It’s available in the UK & Ireland right now and will appear on Amazon Prime in the US on April 10.