Contest: ENTER Misc. Avatar Contest: Vinyl Album Cover ART

[Timewalker]

My musical tastes are pretty tame compared to most people's. I have other favorites, but was unable to find images that would make decent avatars.

1. The Music of Cosmos. This is the music from the original version of Carl Sagan's series, before the 1990 update necessitated substituting different music for some of the segments. I never thought the second choices did these segments justice, so it's good to still have the original available to listen to.




2. The Irish Rovers: The Unicorn. This is the very first Irish Rovers album I ever heard. It was both in LP and 8-track, and it was the 8-track that my dad had. I was 8 years old at the time and remember that the cover art creeped me out.




3. The Irish Rovers: On the Shores of Americay. I don't have this one in LP form, but I do have the songbook that was published (both words and music, and learned to play some of the songs on the organ). Oddly enough, though this group emigrated from Ireland to Canada in the '60s, I found the songbook in a mall in Wenatchee, Washington.




4. The Irish Rovers Live! (see a pattern here? ) This album cover is of scenes from the group's TV show that was on every Sunday night. It includes the lyrics for all the songs on the album, so you can sing along and try to keep up with the increasingly long chorus to "Barley Mow".




5. The Irish Rovers' Greatest Hits. This album has special meaning to me, because it's the one I was able to have autographed when they did a concert just a few blocks from my home. I'd finally achieved something I'd wanted for over 20 years: Meeting this group, and getting to talk to Will Millar (the one holding the donkey). In later years, after leaving the group, Will Millar guest starred on some episodes of The Red Green Show. He currently lives on Salt Spring Island, BC, and is now an artist (he included a print of one of his pictures with my CD order).




6. The Irish Rovers: Emigrate! Emigrate!. This is another album that includes the lyrics for the songs. There was a TV special in which the group dressed in period costume and acted out vignettes that included some of the songs on this album.

 

[Captain pl1ngpl0ng]

^im going out on a limb and guessing that you really like The Irish Rovers?
And, congratz on meeting the band, must have been a pretty cool thing!
(also the music of cosmos is a great cover, it's like it should be posted in a sci-fi-forum or something)

 

[Timewalker]

^im going out on a limb and guessing that you really like The Irish Rovers?
And, congratz on meeting the band, must have been a pretty cool thing!

How'd you guess? And yes, it certainly was.

I've been a fan of their music since I first heard it, at age 8 (there are about 3-4 generations of Canadians guaranteed to know the words to most of their songs, or at least the words to the chorus of "The Unicorn"). I was about 30 when I finally got to meet and talk to them. Add points for explaining to Will Millar how to maneuver a VHS tape out of its cover for the fan in front of me because she wanted him to sign the label on it and it was stuck; I was able to have a couple minutes' extra with him. He asked me if I played music - not a question he asked anyone else, and I was happy to be able to say yes (I play organ, recorder, and accordion - though nowhere near as good as their accordionist, who is the best I have ever heard). Sadly I had to say no to his question of whether I played the flute (the recorder is one type of flute, but not the kind he was referring to).

That was definitely one of the highlights of that decade for me. I'd walked to the concert hall, and pretty much floated home on the proverbial . I recall they drove past on their way to the hotel after the concert and one of them waved (must have noticed I was carrying the album they'd signed).

(also the music of cosmos is a great cover, it's like it should be posted in a sci-fi-forum or something)

I haven't noticed the science forum here does avatar contests. I'm also a Carl Sagan fan. I had a chance to talk to him as well, as he was guesting on a radio phone-in show. My grandmother kept telling me to call the number and hopefully I'd be one of the lucky people who got on the air, but my brain suddenly turned into a chicken with stage fright. I couldn't imagine what I'd say to someone who had such a profound influence on my life (I was in high school when the first Cosmos series premiered). Anyway, apparently they had dozens of people trying to be one of the lucky few, so my chances weren't great in the first place.

Dunno if you ever noticed my former avatar, but it was an animated one of a smiley sitting on a tractor, being towed along by the Enterprise - giving a double meaning to the phrase "tractor beam".

 

[Captain pl1ngpl0ng]

Dunno if you ever noticed my former avatar, but it was an animated one of a smiley sitting on a tractor, being towed along by the Enterprise - giving a double meaning to the phrase "tractor beam".

LOL

my brain suddenly turned into a chicken with stage fright. I couldn't imagine what I'd say to someone who had such a profound influence on my life

That i can understand.... what to say to Carl Sagan?.... "Hi.... you are very good!,... by"?

Add points for explaining to Will Millar how to maneuver a VHS tape out of its cover for the fan in front of me because she wanted him to sign the label on it and it was stuck

hehe thats cool=) the band was unknown for me, i googled a little and it's a long lived band, 1963 to present...
thats like Rolling Stones longevity!

 

[Captain pl1ngpl0ng]

thanks all for entries, this thread are closed and a voting thread will be up in about 5 sec...
Edit.... that was a lie.... the 20 pics limit .... i need to split up the voting thread

 

[Timewalker]

LOL

It's amazing to me how many people didn't get the joke, that a farmer on a tractor was caught in a tractor beam. I was sorry to have to give that avatar up, but since we can't have animated avatars anymore, I decided being static wouldn't do it justice. The smiley artist who created it has a lot of cute science fiction-themed smileys - lots of Star Trek, Star Wars, Doctor Who, and some others, but they are best appreciated in their natural animated state.

That i can understand.... what to say to Carl Sagan?.... "Hi.... you are very good!,... by"?

An hour wouldn't have been enough time to get everything said. I was already into astronomy, but had gotten sidetracked into astrology and ancient aliens, and Episode 3 ("Harmony of the Worlds" in which he debunks astrology) helped me break away from that and back into a rational frame of mind about science.

A later episode about UFOs made me understand the concept of "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". As Sagan said, he'd have been delighted if aliens were visiting us, but he wanted ironclad tangible proof, not hearsay or photos that could easily be faked.

Cosmos introduced me to a wide variety of music I hadn't heard much of before, so my musical tastes expanded considerably. I learned so much from that series, and from the books he wrote. How to condense all this down to less than a minute... it would have been impossible.

I've been watching a lot of BBC Earth in the last few months, and one of the presenters, Brian Cox, used some audio clips of Sagan in a recent episode. It's amazing how calming that was. Cox is very engaging, enthusiastic, and does a great job... but nobody will ever be in Sagan's league.

hehe thats cool=) the band was unknown for me, i googled a little and it's a long lived band, 1963 to present...
thats like Rolling Stones longevity!

Yep, George Millar was just a teenager when they started. The concert where I finally got to meet them was 30 years later, in 1993.

The first time I saw them perform live was when they were headliners at the grandstand show at the annual fair, back in 1976. They performed 6 shows, plus a couple of songs for the kids' show, and I was able to see that and a couple of the evening shows. This was the first time they'd added a new person to the group, and there's a rare album dating from this time. The new man wasn't with them very long, though I think he was part of Will Millar's new group after he left the Irish Rovers.

The members now aren't all the original group. Will Millar quit (royalty dispute over some of the songs), and Jimmy Ferguson died (he was a very good singer and told some of the funniest Irish jokes I've ever heard). Joe Millar retired and his son took his place. So that leaves just two from the original group - George Millar (brother of Will, cousin of Joe) and Wilcil McDowell (the accordionist). Or so it was the last time I checked. Will's departure and Jimmy's death left a gap they couldn't really fill; the old songs just don't sound right anymore with different voices singing them, so I prefer to listen to the old material when the original five were still together.

If you google "Some Mad Irishmen" you'll find the new group Will Millar put together. It's one of their CDs I ordered when he sent a nice email and a print of one of the pictures he'd painted. There are some other musical projects he did; "Celtic Reverie" is especially beautiful - and so relaxing with flute and harp that it took me half a dozen tries to listen to the whole thing because I kept falling asleep!

One thing the old group did that isn't available anywhere on DVD or VHS is the time they guest-starred on The Beachcombers (a long-running Canadian show about a group of people in British Columbia who make a living salvaging logs). This was during the time when the Irish Rovers had their own show that came on after The Beachcombers, so the network said okay to a crossover. The Rovers are introduced to beachcombing when they come to Gibson's to do a concert, Jimmy Ferguson decides to quit the group to become a beachcomber, and the only thing that persuades him to return is one of the beachcombers takes his place in the group (and sings so badly that Jimmy can't stand it and returns). There is a concert in the second half, and I have a serious case of envy for the residents of that town, having these guys filming an episode of The Beachcombers and doing a performance.

Sadly, this crossover was before VCRs existed, and neither series has ever been released on DVD. There are later episodes of The Beachcombers on YouTube and some clips of the Rovers' concerts and location specials from Ireland and Scotland, but none from their regular TV show.

 

[Captain pl1ngpl0ng]

Yeah Sagan is something else.... i also do appreciate cox, he got a good voice too.
Brian Greene is another one i really enjoy hearing/watching, even if it's only a (beautiful) theory.

The Rovers are introduced to beachcombing when they come to Gibson's to do a concert, Jimmy Ferguson decides to quit the group to become a beachcomber, and the only thing that persuades him to return is one of the beachcombers takes his place in the group (and sings so badly that Jimmy can't stand it and returns).

this made me laugh!