Manufacturing Memory: American Popular Music in the 1930's

Cool online Jukebox here, featuring Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire, The Carter Family, Ethel Waters, Blind Willie Johnson, Leadbelly, Duke Ellington, Robert Johnson, Judy Garland, Glenn Miller, etc etc. Doesn't get any better than that.

"American popular music from the 1930's reflects the cultural and social conditions that shaped the American identity during the period. For the purposes of this academic endeavor, the term "popular music" applies to any music in any genre from a select time frame that aspired to and achieved popularity with a particular audience. The popular music of the thirties can be used as a lens to better understand the collective memory of the American people during a decade marked by the Depression, emerging technologies and the growing population of cities as many Americans relocated from rural areas. The music in these pages is in many ways reflective of how Americans imagined themselves during this period. It is important to note that all of the songs posted here were originally released as phonograph records, and as such were the products of an industrial process that shaped this imagination of national identity."

Karoly Grosz, The Universal movie posters

Universal horror poster artist Karoly Grosz is one of the most legendary poster designers of the 1930s. I'm not an expert on this guy, and there's not that much info available online, so you'll have to buy horror movie poster books or search for old universal horror movie posters in online poster shops like Movie Goods or Movie Poster Shop.

But i know that the poster for "The Mummy" is usually considered his masterpiece, and it IS a really awesome piece of work.

The Bride of Frankenstein (1931)


Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932)

The Invisible Man (1933)

The Mummy (1932)


The Old Dark House (1932)

The Bride of Frankenstein (1935)

Public domain films: Reefer Madness (1936)

Some films from the 1930s have entered the public domain and are available on youtube.

As one Youtube comment writer puts it, " Our grandparents smoked pot!"


(That's only part I of the film, more parts here.)

From wikipedia: "Reefer Madness is a 1936 propaganda film revolving around the tragic events that follow when high school students are lured by pushers to try "marihuana": a hit and run accident, manslaughter, suicide, rape, and descent into madness all ensue. The film was directed by Louis J. Gasnier and starred a cast composed of mostly unknown bit actors. It was originally financed by a church group and made under the title Tell Your Children."

Complete wikipedia article.

Robert Crumb

Speaking of comic book master Robert Crumb (1943-), his 'early blues' related art is some of the best and most heartfelt stuff he has done. (He belongs in this blog even though he's not an artist from the 30s, because he's done art ABOUT the 30s.)

Crumb was one of all those pioneering collectors rediscovering the early American music heritage back in the early 60s.

(Album cover)




(trading card set)


(comic book collection)


(Robert Johnson portrait)

I really love the "Secret Museum of Mankind" series of CD's from Yazoo records. THey offer a gilmpse into a nearly forgotten world of global music. They cover the years 1924-48, but a lot of it is from the 1930s.

The tracks from the CDs can be downloaded from www.emusic.com , the cd's can be bought from www.amazon.com

Also check out the Yazoo Records website.

Also from Yazoo records, this lovely CD box is worth buying for the amazing (and hilarious) Robert Crumb cover art, and the music is great too.

Isabel Bishop

Isabel Bishop (1908-1988). Another fantastic artist from the same period, somewhat related to Hopper and Marsh. She also reminds me a bit of Robert Crumb.

"Born in Cincinnati and raised in Detroit, Isabel Bishop came to New York at age sixteen to study illustration at the New York School of Applied Design for Women. She soon transferred to the Art Students League, studying under Kenneth Hayes Miller and Guy P6ne du Bois, and, in 1934, she leased a studio on Union Square where she worked for the remainder of her career. Sometimes grouped with Miller and Reginald Marsh as the Fourteenth Street School, at other times associated with artists like Edward Hopper and Raphael and Moses Soyer, Bishop remains America's most distinctive depicter and visual poet of urban working women.". (Source)

Find more of her work here: http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/bishop_isabel.html

Also a complete book on woman painters available in digital form, which includes info on Bishop and several paintings: "The New Woman Revised - Painting and Gender Politics on Fourteenth Street".


(On the Street, 1931)



(Delayed Departure, 1935)


(Noon Hour, 1935)



(Two Girls 1936)

Reginald Marsh

New York City painter Reginald Marsh (1898-1954) - along with Edward Hopper his paintings fathered the modern 'Lonely People In The Big City' tradition in art. Without them, maybe there wouldn't be any Tom Waits albums or Wong Kar-Wai movies. Well, maybe.

Like another (later) iconic American artist, Andrew Wyeth, Marsh used egg tempera as paint, reviving the old techniques of painters from the middle ages and rennaissance.

You can look at his paintings here: http://www.eeweems.com/reginald_marsh/artwork.html. The Site has links to several biographical articles too.


("Twenty Cent Movie" - 1936)


("Why Not Use the L?" - 1930)


("Along the Waterfront", 1938)

John Ford's "Stagecoach"

I already posted that Stagecoach poster once, sorry about double posting. But it's one of the all time great movie posters, and I spent the evening watching this iconic 1939 John Ford movie for the first time since since I was... I dunno... 8 or 9 years old.

If you want to read a perceptive review of the movie you can go here - if you want a really deep analysis you can go Here.

Anyway, some of the other Stagecoach posters were more than decent too - here's a selection:

Short clip of the scene that introduces the John Wayne character, including awesome use of zoom:

Josephine Baker

Marlene Dietrich will have to wait a bit, can't wait to post a few Josephine Baker photos, but then josephine was anti-nazi too. And a great dancer and singer, and one of the first true black superstars.

Too bad I can't resist cheating a bit and posting a few photos from her late 20s semi-naked 'Dancing Savage' period, that probably means that this blog will be 'flagged' by Americans so I won't become a trusted future resource for American School kids. Too bad. At least there shouldn't be anything to offend most European readers, not even the younger ones... Well not unless they find my bad writing and none-native grasp of English grammar vaguely offensive.

And Josephine Baker was always much bigger in Europe than in her native country the US. She started her career as a street performer in St. louis, but became an instant succes as an exotic/erotic dancer in Paris in 1925. By the 1930s she was a superstar in France, and during World War II she went underground and worked for La Résistance in Marocco. She was awarded some of the highest French orders after the War.

Amazing woman!











Let's see - Youtube clips! woo hoo!



Well, these are really film clips, just songs, but lovely singing:





And here: first part of an 8 part channel 4 docu, "Chasing a Rainbow, the life of Josephine Baker":



more parts here: http://www.youtube.com/user/mrlopez2681

More movie posters

More 30s movie poster, thanks to "The Film Posters of the 30s" book and the http://www.moviepostershop.com . Gorgeous stuff!

I'm trying (and probably failing at) not to sound like a conservative 'everything was better in the olden days' type of guy, but really... what went wrong? These modern and monstrous photoshop movie posters are SO ugly.

And as a special bonus - and old photo of that lovely "Love Before Breakfast" poster actually hanging in the streets back in the 30s. Yay!

The photo is available in hires at Shorpy's.

Dorothea Lange - greatest humanist photographer ever?

"SHORPY - The-100-year Old Photo Blog" has a great collection of old photos in fairly high quality, including some of Dorothea Lange's classics.

Their Lange-collection can be found here, including Lange's own captions. Be sure to check them out, they're in higher quality than those I've posted here.