Monday, December 21, 2009

Live Comedy LA Sends a Love Rocket to Jupiter


Well friends, I'm pleased to report that my latest dalliance with my erstwhile home planet (Earth) was a rousing success.

I brought my live show from the Lost Moon of Jupiter to the upstairs theater at St. Nick's Pub, and all the love and awesome rock power made me feel like I was back in the glory days of yore. I couldn't have had more fun if I'd been necking with Barbarella in a wood-paneled basement with Jefferson Airplane on the hi-fi.

I want to particularly thank the good people at Live Comedy LA, who named Lost Moon Radio their Show of the Year for 2009! Critic Brendon Mulvihill writes...

Show of the Year.

And Lost Moon Radio ran away with it on Friday night at St. Nick’s Pub. I see a lot of comedy and this was by far the most creative show I’ve seen in 2009...

The writing was off the charts. A show like SNL should just scoop up the entire cast of Lost Moon Radio. It would be 100x better.


Thank you, Live Comedy LA! Praise like that puts a Great Red Spot on both my cheeks. You can expect a signed copy of my ill-fated 1968 demo tape for KROQ in your Christmas stockings.

Friday, December 11, 2009

The Daily Candy Is On To Me


Earthbound friends, I stopped subscribing to the Daily Candy back in 2006, when my local delivery boy cut his route short at Io. Just couldn't justify the commute to pick up a copy, as much as I do love candy.

But thankfully the good people at the Daily Candy haven't punished me for my failings. To the contrary, they've made my live show their top pick for a weekend music outing in Los Angeles.

So come join these veritable Willy Wonkas for my ongoing run at St. Nick's Pub. Last night was yet another sellout, so reserve your seats online. It's live comedy, rock n' roll and a heaping holiday helping of yours truly. Plus live band karaoke after every show.

I'll see you there tonight 12/11, Saturday 12/12, Wednesday 12/16, Friday 12/18 and Saturday 12/19!

-Jupiter Jack

Monday, December 7, 2009

A Christmas Carol


You know friends, up here on the Lost Moon of Jupiter, nothing warms my heart more than gazing down at the spinning blue marble we call Earth, and thinking that somewhere, at any given moment, a messiah is being born.

So light up your hearth, take a quaff of glogg, and carol along with me:




And then come join me at St. Nick's Pub's Cabaret Theater for my much-anticipated holiday show, running December 10-19. Tickets here!

Thursday, December 3, 2009

My Next Broadcast


Hello Earth, am I coming in clear? And more importantly, have you cleared your calendars for December 10-19? That's when I make my triumphant return to the St. Nick's Pub Cabaret Stage. Although the front row of seating is reserved for the ghosts of Timothy Leary, Nikola Tesla, and Keith Moon-- in that order-- the rest of the house can be reserved by following this link.

The specific show dates are:

Thursday, December 10 (8pm)

Friday, December 11 (8pm)

Saturday, December 12 (8pm)

Wednesday, December 16 (8pm)

Friday, December 18 (8pm)

Saturday, December 19 (8pm)

Again, get your tickets here, and I'll see you at St. Nick's Pub.

Monday, November 2, 2009

Historic Occasions

Friends, I don't know about you, but every year I've barely shaken off my post-Halloween sugar headache when it's time to celebrate again. Today, of course, marks the 89th anniversary of American commercial radio, an institution that came swinging and crackling into the world on November 2nd, 1920, when KDKA, "The Voice of Pittsburg," began broadcasting as the first officially licensed radio station in the United States. I don't know how you to plan to commemorate the milestone back on Earth, but I can tell you that up here on the Lost Moon, it's a solitary, reverent observance. An old spice-running buddy of mine recently smuggled me a bottle of Saturnian Schnapps from the ice floes of Titan, and I plan to pour myself a glass, lay a Jelly Roll Morton record on the turntable, and think about the dawn of a Golden Age.



But before I proceed with the memorial, I'd like to extend a warm, intergalactic thanks to all the local Earthlings who made it out to Lost Moon Radio's special live broadcast from Spaceland on Halloween night. It was a pleasure to share the bill with bands as talented as Jean Paul Yamamoto, the Peculiar Pretzelmen, and the headlining Fuxedos (to whom I owe special gratitude for inviting me to the event in the first place). The costumes, the crowd, and the company all added up to my favorite-ever Halloween party not hosted by Frank Zappa.

Attendees and returning listeners will be pleased to note that Lost Moon Radio's next live shows have also now been scheduled, and we'll be sending out the signal once again from St. Nick's Pub for two weekends in December: the 10th, 11th, and 12th and the 16th, 18th, and 19th. So mark your space calendars, folks. More details to follow.

Now let's raise a glass to Radio. It's like Jelly Roll says, "I'd rather be there than any place I know. Yes, I'd rather be there than any place I know. It's gonna take the sergeant for to make me go."

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Live Show HALLOWEEN NIGHT

Exciting news, friends. Lost Moon Radio has a special live Halloween show scheduled this October 31st at Spaceland in Silver Lake, California, the "Williamsburg of the West."*



This extra-spooky live broadcast will be part of a line-up of theatrical music stylings, with the bill as follows:


9:00pm - the dance rock of Jean Paul Yamamoto (with Devo's Alan Myers on drums)

10:00pm - a LOST MOON RADIO HALLOWEEN with host Jupiter Jack

11:00pm - the old-timey, stomping, hollering, fire-and-brimstone, bloody-roots-medicine of the Peculiar Pretzelmen

MIDNIGHT - THE FUXEDOS (who apparently may make love to a pumpkin)


Spaceland
1717 Silver Lake Blvd., LA 90026 get directions
Doors open at 8:30.

Tickets are $10 at the door ($8 in advance) and a mere $5 if you arrive in costume. That's the sort of discount that only the spirit of the Great Pumpkin can bring you.

The best news is that because the show doesn't start until late, you can stay home for all your favorite holiday TV specials, and then head out later for the rock n' roll!



*Not to be confused with Frontierland, the Colonial Williamsburg of the West.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Live Performances THIS WEEK

Don't forget that an all-new episode of Lost Moon Radio opens TOMORROW NIGHT!



4 shows only! Wednesday, September 16 through Saturday, September 19. (8pm all nights)

WHERE: St. Nick's Pub 8450 W. 3rd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90048

And the price is $9. This includes the show and a live-band karaoke party immediately afterward! (All abilities welcome.)

Get your tickets online to guarantee admission!



If you've never seen the show and you're curious what's in store, here's an excerpt from Lost Moon Radio's last live broadcast, featuring one of my favorite old school rap battles:



Saturday, September 5, 2009

Golden Record

If you'll indulge my observing another aerospace anniversary, I'd like to point out that it was on this date 32 years ago that NASA launched the unmanned robotic probe Voyager 1. It was Voyager's mission to photograph Jupiter and Saturn, and then to continue onward out of our solar system entirely, becoming Earth's first truly interstellar spacecraft.

Placed on board Voyager 1 was a Golden Record, a compilation LP produced by Carl Sagan and a special team of writers, artists, and astrophysicists. They designed the Golden Record to contain the signature sounds of our planet and civilization at the end of the twentieth century: the surf, the wind, the birds, the whales, and ninety minutes of music from around the globe. America got three songs ’cause we built the rocket. They were ”Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground” by Blind Willie Johnson, ”Melancholy Blues” by Louis Armstrong and his Hot Seven, and Chuck Berry’s ”Johnny B. Goode.”



(Sagan and his team, which included Rolling Stone editor Timothy Ferris, also intended to place "Here Comes the Sun" on the record, a decision favored by the Beatles themselves. But EMI, apparently wary of space pirates and galactic bootleggers, refused to allow NASA license to use the song, in what was probably the first instance of deep space copyright enforcement.)

Today, Voyager 1's trajectory has taken it well past the gas giants and their moons, beyond Pluto and Sedna and the rest of the dwarf planets, through the brutal termination shock and into the heliosheath, home to only a few very lonely comets, 10 billion miles from the sun. In 2015, the spacecraft will push beyond the heliopause, the final breath of our sun's solar winds, and "Johnny B. Goode" will become the first rock n' roll single to journey into interstellar space.

If and when Voyager 1 is finally intercepted by a spacefaring extraterrestrial intelligence (probably an alien race of living machines, according to our most reliable forecasts), what will those aliens make of the Golden Record? If they can decode this time capsule of our world and society, will they take pleasure in our noble intentions, or scorn our folly?

Whatever their verdict, I know one thing for certain. When Chuck Berry's guitar and Lafayette Leake's piano sound out to some distant star, whoever is listening will be hearing humanity at its very best.

Listen to the full Golden Record.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Next Live Show: September 16-19

Hello, Earth. This is Jupiter Jack, just dropping a line down the ol' interplanetary internet to announce the next live performances of Lost Moon Radio.

Wednesday, Sept. 16 (8:00 pm)
Thursday, Sept. 17 (8:00 pm)
Friday, Sept. 18 (8:00 pm)
Saturday, Sept. 19 (8:00 pm)

All FOUR performances will be at

St. Nick's Pub
8450 W. 3rd Street
Los Angeles, CA 90048
Earth get directions

Buy tickets for Lost Moon Radio - Episode 3

Just stroll through the pub's front doors and up her back stairs to the St. Nick's Theater, a punk rock attic space that's the closest thing to Max's Kansas City you'll find within walking distance of the Beverly Center. There you'll be treated to an ALL NEW HOUR of my late night radio broadcast, featuring the finest songs and psychedelic selections from my personal library. Then stick around for LIVE BAND KARAOKE, where you and your fellow audience members get the chance to wail the night away accompanied by our celebrated house band, the Moon Units.

That's a show and a party, all for a mere $9. Because rock n' roll is a recession-proof commodity.

Until then, friends.



Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Telescopes

If you're like me, you won't let this evening pass without raising a glass to old Galileo Galilei, on tonight's 400th anniversary of his remarkable telescope's debut.



It was this ingenious device that enabled the Father of Modern Science to first observe the Mountains of the Moon (see The Grateful Dead's Aoxomoxoa) and, most relevantly to my own explorations, discover the moons of Jupiter.

Of course, Galileo didn't invent the telescope. The first telescopes were built by illiterate sixteenth century craftsmen -- imaginative, resourceful, their names now lost to history -- basically the session musicians of the early Renaissance. The lenses of these early telescopes were aimed around the surface the world, spotting land from crow's nests, spying on Medici armies, peering into the windows of attractive Tuscan neighbors. But it was Galileo who first thought to point the telescope up, into the heavens, and perfected its design with the stars in mind. In just a few short months he had mapped Earth's moon and identified the four largest of Jupiter's sixtysome satellites, which he named, with all the poetry of a Led Zeppelin album title, "Jupiter 1," "Jupiter 2," "Jupiter 3," and "Jupiter 4."



It was actually Galileo's contemporary, rival, and alleged plagiarist Simon Marius who gave the Jovian moons the names we use today: Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto, after four of the Roman god Jupiter's mythological squeezes.

And it was Simon Marius who, in what was dismissed at the time as only a syphilitic hallucination, first spotted the Lost Moon of Jupiter, the quiet little rock where I now make my home.

So here's to Galileo, Simon Marius, and all the other stargazers of the past four hundred years. Keep watching the skies, friends.

Sunday, June 7, 2009

Live Show June 17-20

Exciting news, Earth! I will be hosting 3 live performances on the following dates:

Wednesday, June 17 (8pm)
Thursday, June 18 (8pm)
Saturday, June 20 (8pm)

All performances are at St. Nick's Pub, 8450 W. 3rd Street, Los Angeles, CA, just east of La Cienega.

The show will feature my hour-long radio program followed by live karaoke with my house band, the Moon Units. The price is still just $8. It's the best deal in town!

Buy tickets here!

Note that there is no show on Friday, June 19, when I will be hosting a visiting delegation from Alpha Centauri.

New Klan

An ad that's been in heavy rotation on my station, KTSH.

As Far As Your Brain Can Think

Here's a little ditty that was sung to me by many a math teacher growing up:

Saturday, June 6, 2009

Hello Earth. Am I Coming In Clear?

Welcome, Earth travelers, to my makeshift web page. Although Lost Moon Radio will soon be launching a full-featured interactive website, for now you'll have to settle for this free blog I got via a contact at my radio station, KTSH.

Until the new site is finished, you can catch up with me right here to access podcasts, metaphysical ramblings and the latest info about my next live show.