August 21

Happy Birthday to Stephen Hillenburg, animator; today, we're going to feature his pre-Spongebob work.
His first college degree was in marine biology; in fact, he taught marine biology for several years before he pursued his second life passion, animation. Before he graduated in 1992, he had two short films making the festival circuit. One of those films, "The Green Beret," also appeared on the "Liquid Television" anthology:


His festival shorts caught the notice of animator Joe Murray, who hired Hillenberg as a writer and director for Rocko's Modern Life, which ran for four seasons on Nickelodeon.
The following clip, from "Jet Scream", is one of Murray's favorite episodes in the series:

After Rocko's Modern Life was done, a colleague encourage Hillenberg to pitch the Spongebob character to Nickelodeon. Since his debut in 1999, Spongebob has become Nickelodeon's most successful series; their most recent contract guarantees a ninth season, and enough episodes to make it the longest running series on the network.

I can't offer much insight on post-Spongebob projects: the Spongebob Squarepants theatrical movie, intended as a series finale, was Hillenberg's farewell as an active creator of Spongebob's adventures. Although he heads United Plankton Pictures (which oversees the Spongebob empire), his most prominent activities appear to be on the academic circuit, speaking about his twin loves: marine biology and animation. So, no telling what he'll do once this Spongebob train runs out of steam...

Apologies if this clip still auto-plays: it's still my favorite Spongebob moment, a typically atypical moment that let me know that, within its all-ages confines, anything could happen...

SpongeBob SquarePants: "Band Geeks"

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August 18

Let's sing Happy Birthday to Jon 'Bermuda' Schwartz:


Bermuda's been providing percussion since the day they met, and he used Al's accordian case to provide the backbeat for Al's first radio performance of "Another One Rides the Bus":


Nearly 30 years later, he's helped Al emulate the most popular sounds in pop culture on every album and every tour stop but 3. He even webmasters the official Weird Al site, among others...

Here's a rarity: Bermuda performing with another band. Here he is, assisting behind the skins for rockabilly artist Rip Masters:

August 4

Sometimes, these blog posts generate themselves:


Good to fit in two birthday wishes, but this post is for Helen Thomas, who has sat in White House press conferences since the Kennedy Adminstration. Plus, she was born in Winchester, Kentucky (down the holler from me), so she gets some hometown love.
Here's a great encapsulation about her career, and its recent (and controversial) ending:

However you interpret her statement, she conceded the insensitivity of her remarks. (But that's kind of common for folks her age; that's why we retire them [See what I did there? Just to be clear, that's an attempt by me to offer humor through a sarcastic ageist statement... unless I'm really prejudiced against old people... or I'm trying to boost blog hits by making incendiary remarks... some of my best friends are old people...]) And because she considers herself a journalist (and not a Fox News correspondent [see what I did there? Just to- never mind.]), she retired.

I don't know if anyone is poised to pick up the torch, regarding her relentless equal-opportunity questioning of every administration of the last 50 years. And her record for crushing press secretaries' souls will likely remain unchallenged for centuries to come. (I think I might be ageist. Forgive me.)
Look at what she did to Stephen Colbert (fast forward to 04:20)

July 7

By default, my first choice for today's entry has to be Berry Sakharof. He taught me how to say "Happy Birthday" in Hebrew.
First, let me introduce you to Mr Sakharof. He's considered a guitar god in the Israeli rock scene, since the days of his first band, Minimal Compact, in the 80's. Now a successful collaborator, producer, and solo artist, he is a major concert draw in Israel.
"Yom Huledet" ('Birthday') was a song on his 1995 album "Cham al hayareach" ('It's hot on the Moon') that got a trance-y remix from Infected Mushroom in 2002. Here's the Chemical Brothers-esque version:

January 5

This one's for Ted Lange, actor-director-playwright. He's even done a one-man show about Paul Lawrence Dunbar. But for a generation, he was the sultan of swagger Isaac Washington, bartender on the "Love Boat."
So here's a clip from the episode where Isaac's new girlfriend (played by June Pointer of the Pointer Sisters) seems to be using him for free booze. Why couldn't it be Stevie Nicks using Doc for pills? Or Anne Ramsey using Gofer for backrubs? Anyway, here's the Pointer Sisters harmonizing on "Happy Birthday":

December 18

In the interest of perspective (and page hits,) here's some of the people that are celebrating their birthday today...

Christina Aguilera
Katie Holmes
DMX
Stone Cold Steve Austin
Steven Spielberg
Keith Richards

If you see any of these people today, tell them "Happy Birthday"...

Now, let me shine a light on our featured celebrant for today, animator Andrew Kepple. He's from New Zealand, and for the past few years, he's been creating compelling and hilarious Flash cartoons under the name Too Much Spare Time. His style leans toward the Terry Gilliam/South Park style, but layered thicker than fruitcake, and possessed of its own language of humor.
Y'know, Avatar makes its worldwide premiere today; James Cameron's latest masterpiece is supposed to be the next benchmark of computer animation, same as every new Pixar movie and all the movie Zemekis seems to do these days. But I'm all about the other computer animation revolution, the kind that empowers one person with a singular vision to produce their own animations at the speed of thought (comparatively speaking) and share it unfiltered. Imagine what Tex Avery or Ralph Bakshi could have done if they had started with Flash animation.
Anyway, talking about cartoons is like dancing about architecture. Here's a perfect posting for our blog, "French Erotic Birthday"



Besides the usual suspects, it's easy to find Andrew Kepple's work at NewGrounds.com or AlbinoBlackSheep.com.

October 23

Here's the song "Happy Birthday," from the man who never quite gives you what you expect, birthday boy WEIRD AL YANKOVIC"



I can either overdo the superlatives and drop them altogether when talking about the legend that is Weird Al Yankovic, who's celebrating a half century today. I wanted to grow up to be like this man. In retrospect, I may have listened a little too much; oh, well...
But I love the guy too much to do a decent encapsulation of his work, so let's concentrate on 2009. He's fully in the digital age; several songs from his next album are already on iTunes (because today's pop songs don't have the shelf life they used to.) He also directed a short film, "Al's Brain", that debuted this summer at a couple of outdoor festivals. And he inexplicably made an appearance in Rob Zombie's Halloween II (dangit... now I have to see it...)
So here's Weird Al in 2009, doing a style parody of the White Stripes in... "CNR":

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That's right, if you join the JibJab website, you can put yourself in a Weird Al video, in honor of the man himself today. And, for crying out loud, tell Weird Al Happy Birthday and thank him for walking the Earth...

September 1

Sometimes I think like a journalist; sometimes, I think like a fanboy. Looking over today, I found a quartet of reality TV stars, and started concocting an insightful analysis about the nature of acquiring 21st century fame. But then I saw some of the other birthdays that I just had to talk about instead.

Joe Trohman’s the lead guitarist for Fall Out Boy. And just how out there does Fall Out Boy have to be when the lead guitarist is the Ringo Starr of the band?
I haven’t given their latest album a chance; I can’t listen to them without reflecting on how star-baiting and studio-dependent they’ve become. But I still got a sweet spot for “Under the Cork Tree,” when the CD sounded like the band does live.


As long as I’m talking comic books, I have to mention birthday boy Jhonen Vasquez, the creator of Johnny the Homicidal Maniac and Invader Zim, and the man who made Hot Topic a mint. If you want to raise your children to be world conquerors, read them “Squee” when you tuck them in at night. He’s put down the pens for a bit, and returned to his college major: film. He directed this music video for Mindless Self-Indulgence:

It hints at what he might unleash on the world when he finishes his first feature-length film. And now you know as much about it as I do.

While we’re talking about more-than-average Joes, let’s talk about Joseph Williams. Joe was the lead singer for Toto, during their “I’ll Be Over You” era. He was Matthew Broderick’s singing voice in “The Lion King.” But we’re talking about him for his songwriting, a talent that he may have inherited from his father, 45-time Academy Award nominated composer John Williams.
While John Williams is celebrated for his music, he’s not hired much for his lyrics. Son Joe got the assignment of writing two songs for “Return of the Jedi:” the Ewok celebration song, and “Lapti Nek,” a dance track by the Max Rebo band, the house band of Jabba the Hutt.


Conway Twitty always existed in another universe to me. Growing up in Georgia, I used to see the bumper stickers everywhere for “Twitty City”, some family vacation rite of passage in the South. I thought it was some sort of amusement park (that was Dollywood,) instead of another would-be Graceland constructed by country music’s appeal for a whiter Elvis Presley (He was rock and roll enough to inspire the 60’s Broadway play “Bye Bye Birdie”.)
Twitty City’s now a facility for the Trinity Broadcasting Network, and country music today sounds more like the Eagles. But, since I never miss a chance to play a birthday song, here’s Conway Twitty’s “Happy Birthday Baby.”

Tomorrow: we rock out. I promise...