It was 40 years ago today...

(Well, give or take a year or so...)
What am I referring to? Well, perhaps I'm jumping ahead of things... or leaping way back... what am I saying? I dunno... Let me start again...

Our Out Of Bodies Holiday page, which features some Holiday music we've sent to each other throughout the years, has inspired an old friend of ours to send us a recording of his own... Art & Design schoolmate Hector Noel sent along this nice little rendition of him playing John Lennon's "Happy Christmas (War Is Over)"...

 Happy Christmas (War Is Over) - Hector Noel

He wrote of it...

"...me playing Lennon - you kinda inspired it because of the Out of Bodies and High School - we were Sgt Pepper!"

With a Little Help From My Friends...

Wow! Yes, I guess we were...
...my recollections are a little sketchy about this - but as I recall, at some point Hector brought in this amazing hand-made Sgt. Pepper's outfit that his grandmother had made for him! I mean, this beautiful, thoughtful grand ma-ma had made a beautiful, authentic looking Sgt. Pepper jacket with her own hands for her Beatles-obsessed grandson - how cool is that? Anyway, he brings it in to school - knowing full well that I too was a Beatles fanatic - and together somehow this sparked a desire for us to attempt our OWN re-creation of the Sgt. Pepper album cover, with US as the fab four!

Hector as Paul McCartney

He was going to be Paul (he kind of had the baby-face thing going, and after all, it was HIS suit) and I was going to be George (the hair, I guess) and two other classmates were going to be John and Ringo - although at the time neither of them knew it yet. Now, we only had ONE suit, so we were going to take turns wearing it - and with the help of Dr Martin inks (remember, this was pre-Photoshop days!) we were going to hand color black n' white photographs accordingly. It was a BIG project (to say the least) that was going to incorporate photography and a lot of snipping, cutting and gluing - but in the end we were all going to have our own photo of the final Pepper cover for our own... it was an exciting endeavor...

Donald as George (with oh-so-fake mustache)

So Hector, who majored in Film Making, and who also was no doubt familiar with photography - took a series of photographs after one of our classes (probably photography) with and without cheesy glue-on mustaches that we hastily made for the shoot (which looked absolutely awful) - and we posed in positions that were sort of half-ass planned to be inserted with instruments we didn't own. We did have Hector's bass guitar though - and as he recently mentioned to me he also brought in a clarinet (which I don't remember at all) and he assures me that he still has the myth-busting photographs to prove it... lying somewhere underneath his house, stored in a Tupperware container. He promised he would fetch them, and when he told me this it was like hearing he had found the Holy Grail. I wrote him "don't let me wait too long - I am running around in circles!"

Let It Be...
Well, like a lot of plans back then - the Sgt Pepper cover project eventually fell apart. I don't know exactly WHY, but I think it had something to do with the guy we had planned on using as Ringo. Evidently, the guy we approached to be our Ringo was actually INSULTED that we thought he looked like Ringo! (Funny! And not to mention a little insulting to Ringo Starr, but true!) - - and I recall that he first said no, then okay (reluctantly) and then NO again - and that was it - we lost our Ringo.

The Ringo that got away.

Now John, I am drawing a blank on John. Who could've been our John? I do know that totally separate from this project I had taken some pics of Lloyd as John Lennon - but it was clearly a 1980 Double Fantasy John Lennon that we had snapped a few years after graduation.

Lloyd as John Lennon, circa 1980.

The Pepper project John - well, I can only assume that out of everyone I knew back then that had even an inkling of Lennon-esque looks - Dan actually fit the bill. I'd have to ask him. Come to think of it, yes... I think it was Dan.

We had Dan in mind for John.

...and in The End...
So there goes the story of the Sgt Pepper remake cover that never happened. This story actually belongs in Ponderings... perhaps if I get around to it, I will add it there. And just maybe Hector will get around to crawling under his house and finding that Tupperware of pictures - so that I can assure myself that it actually happened - and that it wasn't all just a fever dream I had once. And yes, you'd think that the few pics I have myself that I posted here would be proof enough - well, according to Hector almost anything can be faked... just ask him about the Twin Towers, he'll tell you. Wait, on second thought don't do that...
...please don't...

Wait a second... I thought Hector was supposed to be Paul!

to be continued...

---

Merry Christmas from the Out of Bodies!

What would Christmas be without some cheesy holiday music?

Enjoy some tunes from us to you and yours!

Click HERE to go to our Christmas page!

^^^

Haunted Barn's KONGSGIVING Show!

The Haunted Barn Movie Museum/Movies to Go

Step into Thanksgiving 1970s as we remembered it!  It was a NYC tradition and Haunted Barn is going to re-create for you...we're not even shutting the lights...a very impromptu KONGSGIVING to get to know new members and to celebrate with old fiends!!  Please bring a snack or drink to share with your fellow Skull Islanders. This is the actual Channel 9 broadcast of the "Holiday Movie Special" complete with ALL the original commercials you love! Come share it all over again with us!!!

This Saturday evening, November 25 at 7:30

The Chapel Theatre, 8 Old Dominion Rd, Blooming Grove, NY

 
The usual rare clips, bad jokes and a KONG-SIZED announcement that you won't want to miss!!
See you all at the show!!!

Wwwwoah mah Gawd!!!

An OOB Limerick

There once was a heavy Barista... 

who used to be from Sandanista...

She brought cafe au lait
but the men wouldn't pay...
So she sat on their face with her keista.

-Mark DeGross/Edward Yutkowitz 

 

Greetings from the Out of Bodies!

Well.... TWO of them, anyway...

Donald Jefferes and Joe Vento pose with a Haunted Barn Movie Museum/Movies to Go kiosk,
April 2017

Them again?

Yes! After months of procrastination I've finally decided to update our humble little website, fix all the random little links previously rendered obsolete by outdated script - and generally give it a good once-over to ensure everything works like it's supposed to... in particular our MUSIC page - which, thanks to the good people at computer-geek you can now listen to our sound with an ALL NEW streaming player made for easy cross-browser compatibility, bringing you continuous OOBy goodness - - no matter which computer browser you prefer to use!

So DO drop in again and check out our latest additions! There's always something stupid, I mean NEW to discover at outofbodies.com!!!

Do Not Open!!!

No no no - - I said DO NOT OPEN!!!

Ohhhhhh...... too late!!!

Today's cartoon!

Many Out Of Bodies sessions were saved,

thanks to this tried and trusted method...

a message from outofbodies.com

Out of Bodies Unsolved Mysteries - Part Two

The Haunted Toy Robot

submitted by Mark DeGross

Consider for your disapproval... Upon my 54th birthday, I received a parcel from my Brother. I eagerly opened the package to find the iconic Lost in Space 'B-9' robot, from the classic sci-fi space series. Standing at 11" tall, once a button on its side is pressed, its lights flash and it utters several familiar phrases- "Warning!..warning!!" "Danger!!" "That does not Compute", and a few others. I decided to leave it boxed and placed it with the rest of my collectibles of my boyhood memories...

...and then it started...

...about a year later, the lights started to randomly flash anywheres from 5 to 10 minutes automatically, with no button push assistance... occurring quite often! Thinking maybe it was an ominous signal that my brother was in trouble, I had contacted him to see if all was okay with him, in which we shared a laugh over my haunted B-9. So now I think that maybe the spirit of Bob May, the robot's operator, who passed a few years ago is reacting with the toy..I only know one thing for sure... if it begins to talk on its own as well, I'll CRAP MY PANTS!!!...

 

*Disclaimer: No button was pushed, crack pipes smoked or magic mushrooms consumed in the making of this video.

Out Of Bodies Unsolved Mysteries - Part One

The Unexplained Basket of Dolls at Dan's House

To this very day I STILL haven't gotten an answer about this strange mystery - with the possible exception of when Dan said earlier this month "I had nuthin' to do with that - that was all my mom!" ...But I felt compelled to at least convey this haunting to Dan, and perhaps put it all to rest when I wrote him the following...

Dan... I remember your mom had a really creepy basket of dolls that was just sort of.... THERE.... in your living room....

There was NEVER any explanation for it - just a large wicker basket with a heap of doll bodies piled up on top of each other... mostly CLOWNS I believe. There was nothing to suggest these dolls were on display as cherished collectibles or anything like that - as it was just a ragged heap of doll bodies - some faced down, some peering out from underneath others - some dolls were completely out of view altogether!

At closer inspection (if you bothered to get close enough to look) you'd notice these dolls were less than perfect... they had cracks in their faces, splits across their noses, tears and stains in their fabric - like they were obtained from the bottom of Buffalo Bill's basement pit from that Silence Of The Lambs movie...

...and what was worse is they were RIGHT THERE near the entrance way to "GREET YOU" when you came in - and GLARE at you when you left! Mind you, considering some of the other eye-catching oddities your mom had in her living room - like the paint-by-numbers and puzzle art she had hanging on the wall - this pile of dolls wasn't COMPLETELY out of place - but it did manage to jar your senses when you would stumble upon it - it was unsettling... this battered pile of doll bodies... it was as if one had stumbled upon a horrifying mass grave!!

Even your mother's bird that was in a cage just a few feet away knew something was wrong - the poor thing would hardly ever make a SOUND!! One can only imagine what that bird has seen - but dare not speak of...

On one occasion I remember feeling particularly fearless as we were doing one of our music videos in your living room. I remember picking up one of them and wiggling it at the video camera. Remember that, Dan? If you need a visual to jog your memory, well, here it is...

Funny at the time? Well, maybe. But it was no laughing matter, Dan... It did, and still does give me the chills - and Joey won't even SPEAK of it. Lloyd claims to have not noticed, although I feel he is just burying it in his subliminal conscious - and Mark, well I haven't asked Mark yet, but I'm sure if I did it would make him ball up in a fetal position.

You can tell me now, Dan... I mean, it's been YEARS - what's the story with that creepy basket of dolls? WHY DAN? WHY WERE THEY THERE? FOR GOD'S SAKE DAN!!

WHAT HAPPENED IN THAT HOUSE??....

Sarah Silverman in a gorilla suit - just because!!

Hey Joey, with my adulation of Sarah Silverman and your penchant for Gorilla suits - here's something to get us BOTH a little warm and toasty on a miserable wintery Monday!! Enjoy, buddy!!