Programming note: Join Mark tonight for Episode Nine of our current Tale for Our Time, Agatha Christie's Murder on the Links. Tomorrow, Sunday, he'll be here with Part Ten of the new audio serialisation of his highly prescient demographic bestseller, America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It.
~On this week's episode of Mark Steyn on the Town, Steyn starts big and ends bigger. In between we visit our Café Continental and Café Imperial, enjoy a cavalcade of we Non-Stop Number Ones down the decades, and play some songs for this season of remembrance.
To listen to the programme, simply click here and log-in.
~Thank you for your kind comments about last week's episode. Graham says:
Just finished listening to this evening's show and felt I must thank you for a thoroughly enjoyable and informative programme. The only problem is that the hour goes too quickly!
Alison Castellina, a Mark Steyn Club member from the English Home Counties, enjoyed our Non-Stop Number Ones:
I actually remembered to listen today, live on Serenade Radio, while cleaning the kitchen. The delightfully witty 120 year old number gets my vote.
Gary Alexander, our West Coast music maven, agrees:
Where else can we hear songs about 1905 Oldsmobiles with special updated models offered by Bing and Judy? That parody gets my vote for your most delightful discovery this week.
This got to me thinking about car brands in song. When I splurged on a Cadillac lately, I researched the number of songs in various genres that mention (mostly praising) Cadillacs and found at least six, ranging from Chuck Berry to Dizzy Gillespie. Do you know any song placement plugs for brand names rivalling the Caddie?
We think Chuck Berry's "coffee-coloured Cadillac" is the most famous Caddie lyric, Gary. But Mark is ransacking his brain to see if Sinatra ever sang about a Toyota Corolla.
For Nicola Timmerman, an Ontario Steyn Clubber, the highlight was our Café Continental:
Loved the Italian Dracula Cha Cha Cha.
Jake, a Devon member of the Steyn Club, won't argue with that:
The Dracula track was a hoot! Instead of being secondary schooled about ox-bow lakes or pig iron production why couldn't they have taught us something useful like how to waltz or cha-cha-cha?
It's strange how an early exposure to a lyric can last so long. We had a 78 of Bing singing Teddy Bears' Picnic/Ghost Riders In the Sky and I always heard 'Their brands were still on fire and their hooves were made of steel/ Their horns were black and shiny and their hot bread eagered feet.'
Thank you all. On the Town is Steyn's weekly music show on Serenade Radio every Saturday at 5pm Greenwich Mean Time - that's 6pm in western and central Europe or 12 noon North American Eastern. You can listen from almost anywhere in the world by clicking the button at top right here. We also post On the Town at SteynOnline every weekend as a bonus for Mark Steyn Club members. You can find all our previous shows here.
We do enjoy your comments on our weekend programming. Steyn Clubbers are welcome to leave them below. For more on The Mark Steyn Club, now in its ninth year, see here - and don't forget our special Gift Membership.
Mark Steyn on the Town can be heard on Serenade Radio at its regular times, now recovered from the momentarily misaligned hemispherical time-zones:
Saturday 5pm London time/12 noon New York
Sunday 5am London time/9pm Los Angeles
