www.powsley.blogspot.com in 2009!
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
more vintage CHIPMUNKS!
45 sleeves from my pal Gary Matheson's collection. This is back from the time when THE CHIPMUNKS were something good and under the control of ROSS BAGDASARIAN. You would never see these little guys wearing gansta clothes and singing hip hop."HAPPY (the baby new year)" 2009!
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HAPPY 2009 from HAPPY, The Baby New Year! You may have noticed that we dropped off EBAY with our ANIMAGIC1 account in 2008. EBAY became FEE-BAY and has treated sellers shamefully. MISER BROS PRESS still sells a few RANKIN/BASS items under seller MISER BROS on EBAY. 
FROSTY THE SNOWMAN
RANKIN/BASS Produced two FROSTY specials....FROSTY THE SNOWMAN (1969) with Jimmy Durante and FROSTY'S WINTER WONDERLAND with Andy Griffith and both are out on DVD. There have been some failed attempts at reviving FROSTY in other pale specials BUT they are unwatchable.THE FIRST EASTER RABBIT
I always loved how RANKIN/BASS' HERE COMES PETER COTTONTAIL covered all of the holidays with it's wonderful story written by ROMEO MULLER. I finally got in THE FIRST EASTER RABBIT with BURL IVES as the voice of G.B. BUNNY. Burl has the SAM THE SNOWMAN appearance BUT as a rabbit. It is a cel animated special and rarely seen. The theme song "There's that rabbit" by Maury Laws and Jules Bass, is one of their BEST!
Monday, December 29, 2008
Sunday, December 28, 2008
THE NEW ADVENTURES OF PINOCCHIO and THE TALES OF THE WIZARD OF OZ DVDs by RANKIN/BASS
I was watching and enjoying the collector's DVDs for RANKIN/BASS' THE NEW ADVETURES OF PINOCCHIO and THE TALES OF THE WIZARD OF OZ. They were wildly popular in CANADA due to the use of Canadian talent in both series!
HANNA-BARBERA Holiday reading
Hope everyone had a nice Christmas! JOSH and I love collecting this GREAT, vintage H-B art!Working on CD #4
Writing new songs for my fourth CD "DRAMA FREE," which I hope to record demos in January and February and bring to Tempe, AZ in the Spring! I just read that my friends Nate and Sam from the Tempe band THE FORMAT broke up in 2008. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND the two CDs that they did release under THE FORMAT.What RANKIN/BASS Collector's DVD-Rs do you have? Just got a few more in!
As you know, we have some cool RARE collector's DVDs here: 1. 1964 RUDOLPH w/ commercials/THE LITTLE DRUMMER BOY w/ commercials and GRINCH w/ bank bumpers $35 2. THE NEW ADVENTURES OF PINOCCHIO 1 and 2 $15 each 3. THE LIFE & ADVENTURES OF SANTA CLAUS $20 4. THE FIRST CHRISTMAS $15 5. THE TOMFOOLERY SHOW w/ 4 episodes + WILLIE MAY, THE SAY HEY KID $20 6. TALES OF THE WIZARD OF OZ 1 and 2 $15 each 7. THE FLIGHT OF DRAGONS $20 9. THE BALLAD OF SMOKEY THE BEAR (1966) with THE RED BARON $25 10. THE MOUSE ON THE MAYFLOWER w/ commercials and two FESTIVAL OF FAMILY CLASSICS including THE CHRISTMAS TREE + 2 NEWS appearances with the restored SANTA & RUDOLPH ANIMAGIC figures $25 11. THE RELUCTANT DRAGON & MR. TOAD SHOW $20 12. MAD MAD MAD COMEDIANS + 2 FESTIVAL OF FAMILY CLASSICS $20 13. THE BERMUDA DEPTHS with extra scenes $25 14. WILLY McBEAN & HIS MAGIC MACHINE (1965) re-mastered w/ trailer $20 15. TALES OF THE WIZARD OF OZ Vol. 3 $15 16. THE LITTLE DRUMMER BOY, BOOK 2 $15 17. MAD, MAD, MAD MONSTERS Plus more! $20 18. THE FIRST EASTER RABBIT with BURL IVES + two FESTIVAL OF FAMILY CLASSICS: JOHNNY APPLESEED and PAUL BUNYAN $20 All prices are for time and trouble and include shipping. Transfers are made from the RANKIN/BASS archives and are from the BEST sources available. e-mail Rickgoldsc@aol.com
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Many fans have suggested a petition over the Holiday week!
NO "MERRY" FOR THIS CHRISTMAS ICON
Arthur Rankin, Jr., creator of such holiday TV classics as RUDOLPH THE RED-NOSED REINDEER, FROSTY THE SNOWMAN, THE YEAR WITHOUT A SANTA CLAUS, THUNDERCATS and THE HOBBIT is dealing with a BURGERMEISTER MEISTERBURGER in the form of WARNER BROS. It seems that WARNER BROS. had underpaid RANKIN/BASS in various ways, including 19 years of impermissible $200,000 annual deductions from the pool of revenues from which Rankin's profit participation is paid.
"It was an accounting mistake on WARNER BROS., part, a mistake that the company's accountants readily admit, right down to the penny," said Rankin. "However, WARNER BROS. is now claiming I caught their error too late. So instead of doing the right thing and fairly compensating RANKIN/BASS for helping generate years of viewer enjoyment, not to mention an awful lot of revenue,WARNER BROS.is hiding behind the statute of limitations."
The dispute dates back to the 1980's, when WARNER BROS. acquired from RANKIN/BASS, the rights to several of the RANKIN/BASS Christmas classics and other animated properties, including the enormously popular 1980's animated television series THUNDERCATS and SILVERHAWKS. The recent WARNER BROS. home video DVD box set releases of THUNDERCATS sold over a million DVDs and they are getting ready to release SILVERHAWKS. Mr. Rankin even graciously appeared on Set #2 of THUNDERCATS in a documentary and did the same for the WARNER BROS. Deluxe DVD release of THE YEAR WITHOUT A SANTA CLAUS (Which is also available in a new box set).
"This is obviously not the right thing to do to a creator of such wonderful programming and the rest of his staff," says Rick Goldschmidt RANKIN/BASS Historian/Biographer. "As in all RANKIN/BASS specials, writer Romeo Muller would reform the villains. This villain needs to be reformed."
"As far as I am concerned," continues Rankin, "There is no question as to what is right and what is wrong. If you take something by mistake, you put it back. You don't get to keep it. We put those kinds of ethics into our shows for children. Maybe the folks at WARNER BROS. should watch a few of them."
There were postings about this at www.forbes.com as well as www.cartoonbrew.com Word is spreading fast!
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
MEEEEERRRRRY CHRISTMAS! MEEEEERRRRY CHRISTMAS! I want to THANK Everyone for a wonderful season! RANKIN/BASS fans are the BEST! I even had one NUTTY fan steal my ENCHANTED WORLD book and on Christmas Eve of all days! He wanted it THAT much. ARTHUR RANKIN and JULES BASS would like to wish everyone the happiest of Holidays (Except for that NUTT).BASED ON THE ORIGINAL RANKIN/BASS CHRISTMAS CLASSIC
Got this in the mail today from my friend Patrick! Do you remember when U2 sang "Helter Skelter" by the BEATLES in RATTLE & HUM? They said that the song was stolen by someone and we are stealing it back.... Well, that is what I am doing with the name RANKIN/BASS, only in reverse. For some reason the companies that own the RANKIN/BASS classics are removing the RANKIN/BASS name from specials they created. This is of course, not right. It is RANKIN/BASS' RUDOLPH THE RED-NOSED REINDEER, RANKIN/BASS' FROSTY THE SNOWMAN, RANKIN/BASS' THE LITTLE DRUMMER BOY and so on.... HAPPY HOLIDAYS from RANKIN/BASS! 
A FLEXITOON CHRISTMAS
Just received Craig and Olga's Christmas card. REALLY like their SANTA puppet creation. Check them out at www.flexitoon.comWHITE CHRISTMAS
Getting ready to watch WHITE CHRISTMAS again. "Count Your Blessings Instead Of Sheep" and "Snow" are two of my favorite songs from the film.
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
We had a GREAT time on the ROE CONN SHOW today with KEVIN MATTHEWS! It took us a few hours to drive downtown BUT it was well worth it. We got to talk about my books, the ROUND 2 TOYS, www.rankinbass.com, www.timeandspacetoys.com etc. We wanted to get BILLIE MAE RICHARDS on BUT they ran short on time. We did get to field a few questions from people calling in. The show aired live during a very long rush hour drive home for many! The snow changed to rain and sleet as we left the studio and made traveling very hazardous!
My Pal JOCKO HEDBLADE! He is the Producer of the ROE CONN SHOW. He booked me on FOX MORNING NEWS years ago and then the MANCOW Show, when he was on Q101. A GREAT guy and a BIG RANKIN/BASS fan!
On the air at WLS RADIO in Chicago!ALVIN & THE CHIPMUNKS
Do you remember when the CHIPMUNKS were good? It has been a long, long time since they did anything good with those characters. This was one of the good things!.jpg)
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