Thoughts of the month and
A Fistful of Soundtracks episode
previews for June 2002.
Jim
Aquino hosts and produces A Fistful
of Soundtracks (anytime at Live365.com and Sundays 2-4PM on KZSC
88.1 FM in Santa Cruz), writes for Silicon Valley Community Newspapers and Metro
Newspapers in San Jose and never trusted
the Psychic Friends Network. If Dionne Warwick were really psychic,
she would have hid those 11 joints in a better place.
Fistful
flashback
Because it's A Fistful of Soundtracks'
fifth anniversary this month, I've put together a timeline of
key moments in the history of Fistful. Don't be surprised
about the program's rather dull goings-on. Film music radio programs
aren't exactly known for wild Hank the Angry Drunken Dwarf-ish
anecdotes:
June 21, 1997: The very first broadcast
of A Fistful of Soundtracks takes place at 12:30 AM on
KZSC-FM in Santa Cruz. The first song is Isaac Hayes' "Theme
from Shaft."
May 9, 1998: Paul Dini, the talented
cartoon and comics writer who snagged an Emmy for his work on
Batman: The Animated Series, is interviewed on Fistful.
May 23, 1998: Star Wars alum
and cartoon voice actor Mark Hamill is interviewed on Fistful. That's how pathetic this
program is — the biggest celebrity that I've interviewed
on the program is Hamill. (But have you heard Hamill's freaky
— and underrated — voiceover performance as the Joker
on Batman: The Animated Series and its various spinoffs
and sequels? Hamill is like Mel Blanc-gone-all-Method-y. His Joker
is way more menacing and interesting than Nicholson's Joker.)
September 12, 1998: Fistful is
no longer broadcast live because of my frustrations with flubbing
on the air. The first entirely prerecorded-on-tape edition of
Fistful is "A Fistful of Soundtracks Goes Ape,"
a special about the Planet of the Apes movies. From then
on (until January 2000), every edition of Fistful is filmed
in front of a live studio audience.
October 31, 1998: The program's first "official" Halloween Special airs. The special mixes horror movie music with
sketch comedy.
April 25, 1999: The Fistful website,
Jim.Aquino.com, is born. Bring on the porno ad spam mail!
May 1999: KZSC begins Webcasting, so
Fistful is heard for the first time on the Internet. A
few months later, KZSC discontinues its Webcast. Fistful
isn't heard online again until 2002, when Fistful expands
to Live365 Internet radio.
July 24, 1999: Veteran film and TV composer
Gerald Fried (Star Trek, Roots) is interviewed on
Fistful. Fried's most beloved composition is the fight
music from Star Trek, which has been spoofed in episodes
of The Simpsons, Futurama and Mystery Science
Theater 3000. Jeff Bond, the author of The Music of Star
Trek, has called Fried's theme "the greatest fight music
ever written for television."
December 18, 1999: The program's first
"official" Christmas Special airs. The Chorus of Department
Store Santas is heard for the first time. They struggle through
— and mangle — such standards as "Rudolph the Red-Nosed
Reindeer" and "The Christmas Song."
January 22, 2000: "D'oh!-Re-Mi,"
a special about the music from The Simpsons, is the first
all-digitally produced edition of Fistful. After graduating
from UC Santa Cruz in 1999, I had moved back to the South Bay
to find work and got enough money to buy the digital recording
equipment I always wanted so that I wouldn't have to edit and
produce Fistful on chintzy tape cassettes anymore. Since
"D'oh!-Re-Mi," every edition of Fistful has been
recorded, edited and produced on the computer.
February 12, 2000: To kick off Black
History Month, I shoot and kill Jar Jar Binks on the show.
April 1, 2000: The themes from Star
Wars, Goldfinger and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
are played backwards on April Fools Day.
June 18, 2000: Fistful celebrates
its third anniversary with "Shaft's Big Scores," a show
centering on music from the Shaft movies and other blaxploitation
flicks.
January 2001: Jim.Aquino.com is named
"Best Movie Music Website" by MovieMusic.com.
April 1, 2001: A pirate radio show that
plays Barry Manilow songs keeps interrupting the broadcast. Of
course, it turns out to be another one of my April Fools pranks.
May 13, 2001: Metro Newspapers film
critic Richard von Busack is given the honors of selecting the
music for this broadcast. The following week, Robert Emmett, host
of the South Bay cult favorite The Norman Bates Memorial Soundtrack
Show, is asked to select his favorite soundtrack tunes as
well.
June 24, 2001: Fistful celebrates
its fourth anniversary with "Your Bond Song Stays on My Mind,"
a tribute to 007 main title theme songs.
October 7, 2001: For the first time
in the program's history, Fistful is preempted by news
coverage. KZSC interrupts its programming for most of the day
to broadcast reports of the U.S. military's initial attacks on
Afghanistan.
December 9, 2001: Adebisi from HBO's
Oz makes Osama bin Laden his bitch during a sketch on Fistful's 2001 Christmas Special.
March 9, 2002: Fistful begins
streaming at Live365.com, one of the world's top Internet radio
services, and further expands its audience. Strange fan e-mails
from Germany, the Netherlands, Scotland and Soledad Prison begin
popping up in my inbox.
Papa's got a brand new mailbag
Here's some recent Fistful fan
e-mail:
From: "Thomas Korn" <kornopolous@...
>
Date: Sat, 6 Apr 2002 22:04:23 -0900
Your "spring" themed show is lacking the most important
springtime song!!!!!
"Springtime for Hitler" from Mel brooks 1968 "The
Producers"!
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Thomas Korn" <kornopolous@...
>
Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 01:22:43 -0800
Ahahahahaahah..... your "Hannibal Barbera" show was
fun. the Monster M*A*S*H.... great idea.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Niels Heidenreich"
<niels.heidenreich@... >
Date: Thu, 09 May 2002 17:01:59 +0200
Hi Jim,
I have recently discovered the "Fistful..."
net radio stream while playing around in iTunes on Mac... just
wanted to tell you that I think it's very nice... I was interested
in film music before, but now I think I'm starting to become a
real fan...
Keep it up :))
Niels
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Harry Reynosa" <reynosa@...
>
Date: Wed, 22 May 2002 16:09:58 -0700
I have been listening to you program
on my Mac. with iTunes. It's great and the stream has not crashed
yet.
I have a question for you, do you
remember the movie The Bad Lieutenant? It had a cool rap song
done over a Led Zep song. It would be cool to hear it on your
show.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Pieter van der Werf"
<pieter@... >
Date: Thu, 23 May 2002 14:58:14 +0200
Hi Jim,
Like listening to your show while
at work.
Could you find and play something from the prison-series 'Colditz',
which was broadcasted in Europe in the 70's.
It's for my collegue Esther: she's trapped in front of her computer
while the sun is shining outside.
Greetings,
PvdW
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Paul Keenan" <paulk@...
>
Date: 23 May 2002 17:13:42 +0100
Yo Jimbo,
Greetings from Scotland....can we
have a request....please stop mentioning that geezer Goldsmith's
name so much...over the past hour you have mentioned his name
at least 255 times....stop we cant take any more..!!!!!
By the way can you play...
1. A track from Trainspotting.
2. The march from Full Metal Jacket.
3. Oompa loompa song..from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
4. Skeleton fight song from Jason and the Golden Fleece.
Gonny geez a mention also..to the
boyz from Hypostyle..Glasgow.
Cheers ya ride.
Jim Aquino
June 1, 2002
© 2002 Jim Aquino
Playing on Fistful in June:
Cowboy Bebop: Knockin' on Heaven's
Door — O.S.T. Future
Blues (Victor)
Cowboy Bebop: No Disc (Victor)
Monsoon Wedding (Milan)
Music for a Darkened Theatre — Film & Television
Music, Volume One (MCA)
Music for a Darkened Theatre — Film & Television
Music, Volume Two (MCA)
Spider-Man (Columbia/Roadrunner/Island Def Jam/Sony Music
Soundtrax)
Cinema Italiano (Decca)
See previous "Intros"
May 2002:
On Spider-Man, "Fistful Internacional Month,"
Cowboy Bebop
April 2002:
On streaming, an April Fools prank, Room 222, Chuck Jones
and Billy Wilder
March 2002:
On Lalo Schifrin at Cinequest and Fistful getting streamed
February 2002:
On excerpts from a reporter's notebook-style diary
December 2001:
On the 2001 Fistful Christmas Special
November 2001:
On the 2001 Fistful Halloween Special
October 2001:
On Sept. 11, Asian American Comedy Night and the Enterprise
theme song
September 2001:
On the deaths of Pauline Kael, Manuel Ticsay (an uncle) and Aaliyah
August 2001:
On the Fistful episode "Fistful on the Run"
July 2001:
On new Fistful IDs and the Fistful episode "Up,
Up and Away"
June 2001:
On Fistful's fourth anniversary