The Hot Show on Christmas Day: And Now There Are Two ‘Yule Log’ TV Loops, One in Hi-Def
Great article in WaPo about competing versions of the Yule Log, which is basically a camera pointed at a burning fire for hours while music plays. The original Yule log has been on TV in New York for years. Now there’s also a hi-def version. The perfect companion to the aquarium channel (and I’m not joking about that one).
Joni Mitchell’s Blue ‘River’ Flows Onto Holiday Playlists
Another timely WaPo piece about how certain songs become holiday “classics.” Focusing on Joni Mitchell’s “River,” the article demonstrates how musical artists, in attempting to be original in their song selection, end up often reaching for the same alternatives as everyone else. In my vast collection, there are any number of somewhat obscure songs that I still have multiple versions of. And how did “My Favorite Things” become a Christmas song? Is it the snowflakes and the strudel? Is it the same reason for Handel’s “Messiah”?
My favorite Christmas records
Terry Teachout does an awesome job of discussing some great Christmas records.
The video below is interesting, but not for the obvious reason.
“Dick in a box…” Yeah, great. Very moving seasonal wishes.
No, the point is this article in the Times. At some point, filmmakers realized that no matter how their battles with the MPAA went, they could just release an unrated version on the DVD. With this move, SNL has now found a way around FCC restrictions. Bleep the lyrics or edit the sketch, but then release the unexpurgated version on the Internet. Is this the wave of the future for television?
Tags: The Yule Log, WPIX-TV, TV, Joni Mitchell, River, Terry Teachout, Christmas music, Justin Timberlake, YouTube, NBC, SNL
2 Responses
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The Pop View Says:
I forgot this article as well, the story behind one of the oddest holiday duets ever:
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Bill Higgins -- Beam Jockey Says:
The original Yule log has been on TV in New York for years. Now there’s also a hi-def version. The perfect companion to the aquarium channel (and I’m not joking about that one).
I like the idea of these, and I think there should be more.
The NASA channel frequently runs long tapes where someone simply pointed a TV camera down at the Earth from a Shuttle. Just hours of oceans, clouds, and landscapes scrolling by. Very peaceful. Word is, getting to look down at the home planet is the most enjoyable part of being an astronaut.
The failed Puppy Channel is well-known. Just puppies playing, 24 hours a day, no people, no talking. I wound up with my brother‘s copy of the PC demo tape — he had asked me to transfer it to DVD. (No idea where his copy of the proto-South Park tape might be, though.)
It might be cool to train a video microscope on a spoonful of pond water. The Paramecium Channel. We could watch microorganisms cavort all day long. Also, we could watch them grow up, grow old, and die. People like multi-generational sagas.
To a physicist who was developing arrays of really cheap optical sensors, I once proposed a worldwide network of sensors watching clouds. Something resembling face-recognition software would detect any clouds, anywhere in the world, that resembled celebrities. If it had any reasonable rate of hits, it might be a worthwhile feed for a cable channel. Or at least an interesting video loop.
You could set up a computer to fly around different parts of the Mandelbrot Set, both zooming in and zooming out. That would give you endless variety.