The Buster Mungus Diaries

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After examining the developments and evolution of American popular music from the turn of the century from the 1920's, through the 1930's & the 1940's, we examine the culmination of styles and circumstances that evolved during the 1950s.
Did Rock & Roll appear before Elvis or Chuck Berry? Could it have been under our noses this whole time, or could yet be discovered in the music we'll play in this episode.

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In this episode we take a look at 4 of my favourite live recordings of all-time. I grew up during the decade of the live album. You were nobody until you had a live album in those days. It announced your triumphs over the previous album releases and marked your maturity, usually with a multi gate fold, poster sometimes included, double LP.
The albums are fabulous in their own right, but they do provide a glimpse at musicians/bands when the material is paired with great engineering and a fantastic performance. Consider the variety and range of performances by the likes of, Jerry Lee Lewis, The MC5, Deep Purple and the Allman brothers Band.

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The length of the typical pop song has averaged around the 3 minute mark since the beginning of recorded music. In this episode we examine how the length of a pop song is shrinking and moving closer to the 2 minute mark despite all the technological advances over the past 100+ years.

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We walk through the history of the Peter Gunn TV theme from its origin in 1958 to its influence on the surf music scene to a massive resurgence in the 1980s. We travel through time with Henri Mancini, Sara Vaughn, Duane Eddy, Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix and many more as we look at how each artist changed or added to the concept of the coolest TV theme to ever grace the boob tube.
Music from Peter Gunn became the number one album in the country on Billboard magazine's charts and stayed there for 10 weeks, remaining charted for 117 weeks in all.

Its status as a standard in any upstarts' repertoire carried it through the rehearsal holes of the world. Somebody somewhere would always don its instant cool, no matter whether honest or bootleg.
Check out http://www.bustermungus.com/ for television episodes of "Peter Gunn", music videos and companion material relating to this episode.
To shop for Buster Mungus "Merch" and "Swag" head on over to https://the-buster-mungus-shop.myspreadshop.ca/

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Perhaps the most telling statistic I’ve come across about disco and more specifically about the Montreal disco scene was that the police reported in 1970 that 80% of Montreal’s missing young people could be found in discothèques.

During the 70s, for some people, disco was all empty glitz and glamour, smoke and mirrored balls and the pinnacle of 70s exhibitionism. Montreal exemplified those qualities during a time when the the city’s greatness was dissolving after reaching its high watermark during Expo 67. Moreover, disco’s origins were far grittier than the slick veneer of the well know Studio 54. Before your mom was doing the YMCA at weddings, disco was the beating heart of the Montreal underground. It was the music of liberation, inclusiveness and empowerment with a four-on-the-floor bassline as its rallying cry.