Filed Under: "music"

untitled illustration, business card, 1950s

Almost. The Flora pretzel-ized trumpet that graces the cover of this rare RCA Victor Living Stereo “cartridge magazine” originally appeared in 1958 on the back cover of the LP Portrait of Shorty Rogers. The illustration was recycled by RCA Victor’s art department on this 1960 Esquivel package, whose format was the (failed) forerunner of the cassette. The LP version of this classic album by the Mexican maestro had a completely different photographic cover. RCA also…

Jim Flora Art LLC is offering three hand-printed 2008 calendars: swingin’ sax, boogie-beat drummer, and starlite moon. We have a limited number (30 each) to sell. That’s it. It’s not a numbered edition — 500 backing cards each were printed by Yee-Haw Industries (Knoxville), but due to scheduling demands, the production team could only finish a few hundred calendars for retail boutiques. JFA LLC received 30 sets for our customers. Sales are first-come, first-served. Each…

Esquire magazine, September 1954

To sustain the classic Flora LP tradition of the 1940s and ’50s, I’ve long advocated restoring his art to record album covers. Aside from one or two knockoffs of existing Flora designs, the first new release to adapt Flora non-LP art was Do This! by Seattle’s Reptet, in 2006. The cover for the forthcoming Raymond Scott Quintet CD Ectoplasm (scheduled for February 2008 US release) was completed last May. Now comes the Quartet San Francisco’s…

Printed, matted and framed by Yee-Haw Industrial Letterpress,Knoxville TN, exhibited at NYC Stationery Show May 2007,to introduce a limited line of Flora cards and calendars.Production underway, projected completion late July.

Now, as it did in 1943 when Flora provided this illustration for a Columbia Records magazine ad:The smiley flora has antecedents: Title page, Pip Pap Po, print from woodcut, Little Man Press (Cincinnati), 1940

Holly of Sweetheartville, a self-described “bitch kitty on wheels,” finds a vintage Flora cover in—well, you’ll never guess where. She also observes that “covering a dining room wall with record sleeves hung with thumb tacks [is] too college.” Perhaps decoratistas can agree on a Flora exemption. UPDATE (02 MAY 07): Mr. Hall wonders if we’re “making fun of [Mrs. Hall] in some way.” No way!

Bet your moose can’t toot his own horn! Know why? Three reasons: 1) You didn’t sign him up for lessons;2) Clumsy, cloven hooves—can’t work keys; and,3) He’s not a Floramoose! Detail from December 1942 Columbia-Okeh new release monthly. Complete booklet featured in The Curiously Sinister Art of Jim Flora.

Year Zero in the Flora Revival was 1992 when Michael Bartalos cold-called the 78-year-old artist to ask about his 1940s and ’50s album cover illustrations, which evoked a mothballed era to the robust, productive retiree. Recalling Mike’s curiosity, Flora later said, “I felt like a fossil that had just been dug up.” Thus began the archaeology, which continues to unearth ancient marvels. The above flashbulb-bleached vignette was snapped at A-D Gallery in June 1943 during…

I’ve hosted a radio program at WFMU since 1975. Thirty-two punch-drunk years. WFMU is a non-commercial, Free-Form station—one of the charter FF outlets, being entertainingly anarchic since 1968. We play anything—popular/obscure, new/old, good/bad; the tasteful juxtaposed with the creepy. We’re an aural curio shop, and “Genre” is a poltergeist who got discouraged and went a-haunting elsewhere. A typical WFMU program sounds like an overactive iPod shuffle. The station has a four-decade reputation and retains an…

‘Tis the season to Pete Jolly! A new silk-screen print has been introduced to our growing line of iconic Jim Flora merch—the artist’s swirly 1955 RCA Victor EP cover for the Pete Jolly Duo. This sleeve rarely turns up on eBay, and Floraphiles have been known to liquidate 401(k)’s to own battered copies. We don’t know much about pianist Jolly or his bassist, but apparently they couldn’t quit bopping long enough to sit still for…