Back in the Day

These have officially replaced the icing phenomenon as my new obsession

We've all oohed and aahed over the Victorian era footage of the carriage ride down Market Street (My, that man's derby hat looks positively smashing! … are those horses?) but honestly, I find the footage in this video from 1984 far more compelling.

It's just some guy driving down Broadway onto the Embarcadero Freeway (for those of us born post-Loma Prieta who don't actually remember it, that part is actually pretty cool) and across the Bay Bridge. Towards the end he's listening to “White Lines” by Melle Mel on the radio. Basically this video is everything  - well, almost everything, since the 49ers aren't in this - that I've imagined being awesome about San Francisco in the 80s, all rolled into one. If I actually were to time-travel to the city in 1984, I'm pretty sure that I'd inevitably end up intervening in my parents' budding romance and screwing up my future existence, but after seeing this, I think it's a risk I'm willing to take.

This second video is much prettier than the other one and shows many different parts of the city, like Fisherman's Wharf when it was actually charming and not horrifying, and Mission Street when those empty theaters that will soon be condos were actually theaters. The parts shot around Nob Hill look basically the same as today, but the rest is mind-blowing.

Maybe it's just the aged quality of the film, but in this old footage the city looks so clean and well maintained, and everyone's dressed really well. I guess the world of the early 1960s really did look exactly like Mad Men! Let it be known that I fully support a resurgence of skinny ties in the Financial District suit-wearing population. For now when I want to see cute sixties style my only option is to go to Edinburgh on Wednesday nights.

So anyway, you know how sometimes on Mission Mission they post about something from San Francisco way back when and all the old timers take to the comments and reminisce? I'd be really psyched if that were to happen on this post. I love all those stories about how much cooler this city was before the dot-com boom.

The Mississippi River Flows into the San Francisco Bay

Check out this bad boy: a 1927 map made by Paramount Studios to tell financiers all the locations they could shoot films in “foreign” settings right here in California.  Cool but I hate to tell you, Paramount Studios of the past, that the New England coast doesn’t have redwoods.  Also, were financiers really knocking at your door demanding to know where you could film scenes featuring “Wyoming cattle ranches?”

(link.  Thanks Neil!)

Reunited and It Feels So Meh

Coalesce, looking so reunited.

Get this: after years of obsessing over their two classic albums of brain-shredding heavy music, dealing with their subsequent break-up, and having their new album of brutal genius bestowed upon me last year, I finally get to let those motherfuckers in the band Coalesce blow my mind live and in person. Needless to say, I’m stoked to be seeing—for the first fucking time—one of my all time favorite heavy bands since my teen years this Saturday at Slim’s. The upcoming show brings a thought to mind: Coalesce is just one of many ’90s-born bands that have recently convened its disparate parts to reunite, and, for lack of a better word, capitalize on the element of nostalgia that so many music lovers (read: people) quite easily succumb to.

Sunny Day Real Estate, looking so early-’90s.

In the past months, the bands Far, Sunny Day Real Estate, and The Get Up Kids, to name a few, have all settled whatever differences there were, and hit the touring circuit to cash in on the elderly (read: 30+) and the young folks, not unlike myself, who hunger for another taste of what they once loved. Now, before I get to my shit talking, I’ll say this: I saw Far twice—once in Sacramento and once in SF—and SDRE the one night they played The Fillmore. I did not see The Get Up Kids, but I probably would have were I suffering from a severely monstrous surplus of money. However, I draw the line here: Cap’n Jazz.

Cap’n Jazz, looking so seminal.

You may be saying, “What the H, Patric? Aren’t you one of those dudes that does that emo thing at Pop’s? Aren’t you more or less required by scene law to attend the reunion of the harbingers of the now-dead genre you propagate on a monthly basis? What the H gives?!”

And you’d be right, but then I’d say, “Well, dude, here’s the thing. I grew up listening to those other bands, waiting for their new albums to come out, wishing my parents would let me go see them play live, and bumming out super hard when I found out I missed my chance because they’d broken up. Sunny Day Real Estate and The Get Up Kids were fucking huge when they were around, and any self-respecting kid in the scene would’ve given their coolest pin and a super-rare colored-vinyl 7” to go see them perform. But guess what, you never even heard of Cap’n Jazz until at least three years after they stopped being a band that no one cared about, unless you went to highschool in the fucking greater Chicago area in the early-’90s, and you probably wouldn’t have ever had the chance to hear their songs if the members hadn’t gone on to immediately join two legitimate bands that people did actually care about.”

At this point, I’d take a sip of a beer (though not PBR, sorry), then continue, “By the way, those guys were fucking children when they made that band. Do really expect a bunch of cynical dudes who are revered by many to be ‘gods’ of whatever they do, and have aged nearly 20 years since they started the band, to still have the same naive angst and frustration they did when they were teenage virgins? That was what made their music actually worthwhile! Not to mention, have you seen the clips of them on YouTube? They were terrible live! Any band nowadays trying to pull that shit at Bimbo’s on a Friday night would get the shit beat out of them. Or at least booed offstage.”

After a brief pause—allowing my words a chance to sink in—I’d conclude my long-winded diatribe, “And don’t you remember Owls? That fucking band was labeled as a goddamn ‘reforming’ of Cap’n Jazz too, but at least they wrote new fucking songs! Now, those guys are just being lazy, and ripping off your 20 bucks for some rehashed shit I’d just as soon listen to every third Tuesday of the month at Pop’s.” (<— so legit)

You may then respond, saying, “Well, shit, Patric. I see what you’re saying, but I got this extra ticket that I can’t seem to pawn off. You still wanna come with me?”

To which I would say, “Oh. Yeah. Totally, man.”

Go Swimming in Time

Matty Matt stumbled upon this by Camp and Alboin and I had no idea this map existed.  Such a side-street amateur.  He adds:

“Dolores Lagoon” or “Lago de los Dolores”? They are used interchangably. Also of note: Rammaytush on one side, Ohlone graffiti on the other.

(link)

Historical Evidence Supports the 'Air as SF's Soundtrack' Theory

As previously reported on UA, Air is being touted by the YouTube/Vimeo communities as the soundtrack of San Francisco.  Newly uncovered evidence suggests that it may also be the soundtrack of impending doom (via big fucking natural disasters).

Historians and silent film archivists have deduced from trade papers of the period, visible weather conditions in film and the wetness of the streets (ie: MAGIC) that this footage of Market Street was shot on April 14th, 1906; just four days before the great quake of 1906 struck and ruined everybody’s Spring Break.

This shit is like Shanghai at rush hour but with less car accidents, opression and MSG.  The bystanders in this film obviously had Spring Break fever; CAN’T YOU SEE HOW WILD THEY’RE GOING?   This was further enraged by the presence of the camera crew and their promises of “Ladies Gone Lusty” tweed jackets if beezies flashed them their knickers.  Note the early 20th Century attention-whore Marina Bro at 4:35 who drunkenly zig-zags in front of the moving cable car.

A side by side comparison of this film and what Market St. looked like after the quake can be seen here.  BUMMER.

Old Shit Is Cool

Over on the dreaded Book of Faces, Shanti Deva has been kind enough to upload her amazing collection of old promotional postcards once distributed by Bill Graham’s fabled Fillmore West.

Shanti writes, “My Dad’s Mom was an awesome Grandma. She liked the artwork so much she got on the mailing list for the Fillmore. She decorated the kitchen with all these crazy postcards. Now I have them. I also have all her Beatles 45’s. She gave me my first pair of GoGo Boots, taught me to crochet, and was the first person I knew to get MTV.”

Shanti, your grandma sounds like she was one hip lady. All mine ever did was criticize my hair and tell me to stand up straight (sorry Mom, but it’s true).

The entire collection can be found here.

Pages