I fell in love with Cynthia Erivo in Bad Times at the El Royale for her stunning performance and magnificent voice. She's go a new single out, "The Good," that puts her vocals front and center where they belong.
I liked Michael Nesmith's work with the Monkees, but never really followed his solo output. I'm thinking that may be an oversight on my part. The video for "Cruisin'" is surreal and trippy as all get-out, and the song itself would be right at home on a Frank Zappa record, or maybe covered by Warren Zevon. What more could anyone want?
Episode 29 of A Moment of Tiki is now live on the YouTubes! This time out I walk viewers through a build of a faux lava accent wall. I spent the bulk of last summer building out this project in the Lagoon, and it was more of a time-consuming than I'd anticipated. Editing all the footage taken over the course of several months proved a challenge unto itself.
Still, this is a vision I had way back when I started this whole crazy home tiki bar build project, drawing on the "transition" motif popular in tiki as well as mid century modern design elements in the stonework. The wall is lava, folks! How very Mid Century Modern of me! This should've been a simple, straightforward project, but finding artificial lava façade in the continental U.S. is far, far more challenging that one would imagine.
Do you find these kinds of tutorials helpful? Interesting? A waste of bandwidth? Let me know what you think! Don't forget to like and subscribe to my channel on YouTube--doing so makes it easier for other viewers to find it!
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This is a little complicated. Eden Ahbez was a proto-hippie who lived under the big HOLLYWOOD sign in the Los Angeles area in the 1950s. He also wrote songs, including "Nature Boy," which was a hit for Nat King Cole. Ahbez recorded an album of beat poetry and exotica, "Eden's Island." It did not do well, and he subsequently abandoned plans for a follow-up. Thing is, he left behind a lot of unrecorded music when he died. The Swedish exotica group Ìxtahuele has gone through Ahbez's archive and recorded those never-before-heard tracks for the ablum "Dharmaland" to be released later this year. "Mana" is the first finished track they've released, and it sounds outstanding with the haunting vocals of Kadhja Bonet. The video is fascinating as well, considering the male actor has an uncanny resemblance to the late Ahbez. How much of this is due to makeup and how much comes down to a fluke of genetics is irrelevant. This is a fitting tribute to the eccentric composer.
I'm not going to lie, folks, I'm excited about this one! In this episode of A Moment of Tiki, we get a first look at Hugman's Oasis, a brand-spanking new tiki bar on San Antonio's famed River Walk. It opens for business Friday, May 7. I, along with Secrets By Miss Lisa, were some of the fortunate guests invited to their soft opening on April 29. They didn't have a full menu and there were still some kinks to be worked out, so I'm holding off on a more formal review for a month or so to allow them to find their groove. But until then, we have this cool sneak peek!
Way back in November of 2018, the San Antonio Heron ran a short story about developer Chris Hill planning to open a tiki bar in the 1890s Witte Building on the San Antonio River Walk. Then in February 2019, they ran another story about the city approving gas-fired tiki torches for the exterior. Wow! Can you imagine how enthused I was? Two years, six months and a global pandemic later, Hugman's Oasis is the first full-fledged tiki space to open in San Antonio since Polynesian Gardens operated in the shadow of the Tower of the Americas during the 1968 HemisFair World's Fair. And it's the first to offer a full menu of tiki cocktails--back in 1968 it was still illegal to serve mixed drinks in Texas! So come along with me for a tour of the space, some interviews and a whole lot of eye candy in episode 28 of A Moment of Tiki:
Has there ever been a more infectious blues instrumental than "Green Onions" by Booker T. and the MGs? I don't think so. Wow, to think this music was initially recorded on the fly as a B side for a track that itself originated as an informal jam...
Oh, and the story of that original jam recording and how "Green Onions" went from an afterthought in the recording studio to a massive hit in the span of just one week is nothing short of astonishing. Give it a listen:
Wow! I've really been lapse in sharing new episodes of A Moment of Tiki here. For that, I apologize. Let's right this listing ship a little with a couple of those backlogged episodes from earlier in the year.
First up is episode 23: Hot Buttered Rum. Having an outdoor tiki bar is great--except when it gets cold. Believe it or not, even though our Central Texas winters are generally mild compared to the Midwest, once that mercury dips down to the bottom half of the thermometer it's no fun sitting outside sipping icy cocktails. What's a tikiphile to do? Simple: Make hot buttered rum! All the effort goes into preparing the hot buttered rum batter ahead of time. Once that's finished, the cocktail's a snap!
Next is Episode 24: Save the Mai Kai! The Mai-Kai, that high holy place of tiki culture, is in trouble. After suffering catastrophic damage to the kitchen in October of 2020, the owners planned to repair, rebuild and reopen. But nothing is ever simple, and complications quickly escalated the price for restoring the Polynesian palace to its fully functioning glory. The situation has grown serious enough that the family has retained a firm to seek outside investors or, gasp, buyers for the property. In this episode of A MOMENT OF TIKI, I go over what is publicly known at this time about the Mai Kai's future, why this place is so special and why it needs to be saved. I also review Tim "Swanky" Glazner's book, Mai Kai: History and Mystery of the Iconic Tiki Restaurant, which is the best and most lavish history of that place ever published. Trust me, it's a keeper.
I wrap up with a rare bonus episode: Snow Day!? On February 15, we here in Central Texas experienced single-digit temperatures and more than 6" of snow. This was the coldest weather, and the most snowfall, experience by your humble host since 1973 (if you're doing the math, I was 3 years old at the time). Unlike most of Central Texas' rare snowfall events, it didn't immediately melt away the following day. No, temperatures stayed below 20F and the snow stuck, and stuck, and stuck some more. I ventured out to document the aberration, because who would believe stories of a tiki bar buried in the snow otherwise?
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