This gallery features Gary Larson cartoons that have phonograph connections. Click on any image to enlarge. Use the Back button to return to your position on the page.
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, May 9, 1981
"Now follow me. Step, step, slither, step...step, step, slither, step..."
Commentary on Step, step, step
Learning to dance using the phonograph had a colorful approach with the dance instructions on Vogue Picture Records. Rhumba lessons included dance lesson instructions, step sequences depicted on the picture record and paper cut-outs of feet that could be placed on the floor to follow step-by-step. This Vogue record is Rhumba Lesson No.1, Side A, produced in 1947
Vogue Record # R739 by Paul Shahin.
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, July 5, 1980
"Aha!"
Commentary: Though this cartoon uses the opening of a radio to expose the true source of the music, this "explanation" can be traced back to turn-of-the-twentieth century phonograph cartoons and advertisements. Edison's 1901 "Looking for the Band" advertisement featured a little boy with a hatchet ready to chop open a phonograph to find the music. A Victrola 1921 Christmas ad pictured miniature performers under a Christmas tree ready to perform. A Looking for the Band postcard of 1909 portrayed two little girls taking apart a phonograph to find the "band." Though no one believed that little people were inside these horns and boxes producing the music, it was an explanation that everyone could understand, and smile at.
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, March 4, 1983
"Well, why don't you come up here and make me turn it down ... or do you just talk big, fella?"
Commentary: The Phonograph as a nuisance machine or a disturbance to neighbors is a joke that can be found in turn-of-the-twentieth century cartoons and literature.
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, November 17, 1984
"Aerobics in Hell."
Commentary: Exercise records were a commodity of the twentieth century. Health and exercise were themes of the Wallace Institute for over 25 years, with early instructional recordings made by Wallace for Columbia records beginning in 1920. The Victor Talking Machine Company likewise had some early recordings like the 1922 record set by Professor Charles H. Collins. Jack La Lanne promoted physical fitness in the 1950's using phonograph records. Under the auspices of the Presidential Council on Youth Fitness, every school child in the early 1960's "exercised" to the sound of the phonograph playing records like "Chicken Fat." Jane Fonda's Workout Book in the early 1980's had a companion two-record album that successfully climbed the charts with tunes to sweat by. Jazzercise, Aerobicize and Mousercize all joined the language of exercising to phonograph records.
If you have forgotten the 1962 official theme song of President Kennedy's fitness program titled "Go You Chickenfat, Go!" (MP3 6mb) (actually called "The Youth Fitness Song," written by Meredith Wilson and recorded by Robert Preston), listen to it here. Note: If you grew up with this song (courtesy of the Presidential Council on Youth Fitness), you know it should have had a warning label. Or perhaps this was the song Gary Larson had as an inspiration for his cartoon "Aerobics in Hell."
For an excellent historical perspective on exercising with the phonograph, click here for Jim Middleton's "Sweatin' to the Real Oldies", courtesy of In the Groove, January 2002 (a Michigan Antique Phonograph Society publication).
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, December 3, 1985
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, September 10, 1987
That evening, with her blinds pulled, Mary had three helpings of corn, two baked potatoes, extra bread, and a little lamb.
Commentary: Though no phonograph is present, this cartoon should bring a smile to Friends of the Phonograph in recalling Edison's first words spoken into the phonograph. Click here to listen to Edison's "little piece of practical poetry." (6.55mb)
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, September 24, 1987
"Listen, I've tried to communicate with him, but he's like a broken record: 'None of your beeswax, none of your beeswax.'"
Commentary: Phonograph metaphors like sounds like a broken record continue to survive in the 21st century but when no more children grow up with phonograph records, when will the connection be lost between the needle skipping on the scratched record and the repetition of the same phrase over and over? And how many children know records were once made from wax? Click here for the Edison National Historic Site's link about yellow paraffine wax cylinder recordings made by Edison (Courtesy of National Park Service).
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, August 29, 1990
Charlie Parker's private hell
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, October 3, 1991
The Far Side
Artist: Gary Larson, October 4, 1993
Later, when one of the monsters cranked up the volume, the party really got going.
© FarWorks, Inc.
Artist: Gary Larson, 1986
Caption
"Hit the bird, Ruth -- he's stuck."
Inside Card
Hope your birthday finds you in a good groove.
Commentary: The metaphor of a record needle stuck in the groove, playing the same sound over and over is unique to phonographs. Being in the groove is also language based on the technology of the phonograph record's groove. With the passing of the record and its groove, how long will in the groove be associated with its origin and how much longer will this joke be understood (without annotations)?
