Welcome to Radio Free Charleston

This is the Archival blog of Radio Free Charleston, the webshow hosted and instigated by Rudy Panucci that launched in 2006 as part of "GazzTV" and has survived to this day as a YouTube-based variety show bringing local music, filmmakers and animators from West Virginia to the world.

Radio Free Charleston is part of the PopCult blog at The Charleston Gazette, and this website is an attempt to organize all the episodes and various spin-off videos in one chronologically-aligned place.

Much of our video archive was wiped out when MySpace committed suicide in the summer of 2013, taking almost one hundred episodes of the show with it. We are remastering, re-uploading and in some cases, restoring those shows and will present them here, if possible, with the original production notes post-dated to their original dates, so that you can trace the show in its original running order. There are some issues with dead links and missing graphics, but we hope that doesn't interfere with your enjoyment of our inane blather.

In May, 2014, MySpace made our old video archives available again, so we will be using those to fill in the missing spaces here while we are still in the remastering phase. We expect this to take some time, and hope you'll bear with us as we build a site where soon we hope many people will waste precious hours at work.

In addition to our full-length episodes, this blog will collect our two "half episodes" from late 2008, and also all of the episodes of The RFC MINI SHOW, which began in 2013 to fill in the space between full-length editions of the show. This blog will also include other videos created by the RFC crew for the PopCult blog.

To keep up with the lastest developments with the show, please visit the PopCult blog and our Facebook page for information on our current episodes.  Radio Free Charleston is still going strong, with both the full-length program and our new RFC MINI SHOWs, and we recently posted episode 200 and have started on our next two-hundred shows.

Thanks for checking us out.

Rudy Panucci

The RFC MINI SHOW # 40

The RFC MINI SHOW with The Jasons

Monday, October 20, 2014

This week The RFC MINI SHOW brings you The Jasons, recorded live at ShockaCon, just last month. The Jasons just marked their first year of performing and this horror-punk outfit from Crystal Lake, New Jersey (by way of the Mountain State) are hotter than ever. With a sound not unlike their fierce rivals, The Renfields, The Jasons slash their way through three chords and a quick beat, leaving few survivors.

The rivalry with The Renfields is so intense that The Jasons’ frontman, Jason V refuses to be seen in the same room as Vincent Renfield.

The RFC MINI SHOW captures The Jasons performing one original tune and one cover of song by a legendary punk band. We also get to witness some of the witty stage banter between the members of the band. You never really get to see the humorous side of Jason Vorhees in the Friday the 13th movies, but on stage, his comedy just kills.

This episode of The RFC MINI SHOW is a preview of sorts for this year’s epic Radio Free Charleston Halloween Special, featuring more music by The Jasons as well as songs from HarraH, Radio Cult and The Possum Kingdom Ramblers. You can see the Radio Free Charleston Halloween Special next week.

Episode 201 of RFC

RFC 201 with WATT4, Super Heavy Duty and more!

October 13, 2014 by rudy panucci

Our first post-milestone show features music from WATT4 and Super Heavy Duty, plus animation from Third Mind Incarnation and a short film by Frank Panucci. With this episode, Radio Free Charleston reverts back to its original format, with a shorter running time and more frequent shows. 

The plan is to alternate weeks between full episodes of Radio Free Charleston, and episodes of The RFC MINI SHOW.

We shot our host segments at Riverside High School, after driving around looking for some nice fall foliage, and not finding that enough had turned yet, so we called an audible and shot in Quincy.

The RFC MINI SHOW #39

The RFC MINI SHOW starring The Velvet Brothers

Monday, October 6, 2014

Some of the Velvet Brothers (it’s so hard to get them all in one shot)

The legendary Velvet Brothers, reunited in September, 2014 at Bruno’s on Leon Sullivan Way in Charleston. In this edition of The RFC MINI SHOW you can hear them perform “Savannah Rose” and “De Do Do Do, De Dah Dah Dah.”Yes, that latter song is a cover of the old Police tune, rendered in a velvety-smooth lounge version.

The full Velvet

The Velvet Brothers were the first full band that I featured performing live on the Radio Free Charleston radio show way back in 1989. We’d had some acoustic performances on the show, but never a full band. The studio wasn’t big enough to hold the entire band, so we ran cables all over the building with the drummer in the hallway, the bass player in the production studio, and the keyboard player in the newsroom. With the guitarist and vocalist in the FM studio with me, the band managed to create a magic moment, even though it was three in the morning and they’d just played a full set at The Charleston Playhouse earlier in the evening.

This shoot, about a month ago, was a blast. Bruno’s was packed. I was straddling a potted palm tree in what turned out to be a lounge/mosh pit. At one point I think I rode the tree into the keyboard player, “C.R. Smoothee.” We got some great music and now you can enjoy a little more of The Velvet Brothers.

PopCult 2014 Rod Run Doo Wop Video

Video Overload, Cool Cars,

Friday, October 3, 2014

 
After a week where your PopCulteer posted a record amount of video, we slide into the weekend with a variety of topics, plus just one more video (or five).
This week we will address the Suddenlink stink, toss plugs your way for a night of animation, a local filmmaker’s bid to work for Motorhead, plus a rundown of local shows, and we’ll also bring you a mini photo essay from the subject of this freshly-made video of the 2014 Charleston Rod Run Doo Wop Car Show…


At the end of this week’s PopCulteer we’ll show you some bonus car show photos.

PopCult ShockaCon 2014 videos

In this one big post, we present the first batch of PopCult videos of ShockaCon 2014

Sunday Evening Video: The Walking Dead Speak!

Sunday, September 28, 2014

Moses with Fred Williamson (swiped from Facebook)

We’re running a bit late this week, but we have the first of many videos from the just-concluded ShockaCon horror and science fiction convention.

This video is of Friday’s panel featuringThe Walking Dead‘s Moses J. Mosley, one of Michonne’s pets, and Jeremy Ambler, the noted walker from season two. They answer audience questions and

Jeremy at ShockaCon (swiped from Facebook)

talk at length about how they came to be cast on The Walking Dead, going through Zombie School and what it was like on the set and going through the elaborate makeup process.

Over the next several days you can expect many more videos from ShockaCon, including a cool musical montage wrap-up. Those videos are collected below the jump.

Episode 200 of RFC

RADIO FREE CHARLESTON 200

September 22, 2014 by rudy panucci

Radio Free Charleston has finally reached its 200th episode, and it does so in a grand manner with four never before seen performances by the area’s top bands, plus animation, short films and more. Your host, Rudy Panucci, presents songs fromFarnsworth, The Laser Beams, HarraH and The Velvet Brothers. There is a short film from Frank Panucci, a movie trailer from Jake Fertig and the first new animation featured on RFC from Third Mind Incarnation since 2007.

Hosting the show in front of some building

This episode of the show is called “Blues Brothers Shirt,” named after a shirt which your host received as a gift from his new wife, Melanie Larch, the day after they got married less than four weeks ago. This milestone episode of the show is a monument to procrastination. If I had continued producing Radio Free Charleston at the pace that I did between 2009 and 2012, we would have hit episode 200 last November. I wanted to make the show really special and came up with grandiose plans and panicked as the date approached.

The RFC MINI SHOW # 38

The RFC MINI SHOW starring SUPER HEAVY DUTY

September 15, 2014 by rudy panucci

The RFC MINI SHOW number thirty-eight, starring Super Heavy Duty, was a real treat to put together. The band is a supergroup consisting of members of The Pistol Whippers, The Tom McGees, Beaver Knievel, and 69 Fingers. 

Two of the members of this band, Bobby Peyton and Brian Holstine, have been RFC favorites since they appeared way back on Episode 8 in 2006. Our cameras were there for the first full blown performance by the band last month at The Empty Glass. It was an unforgettable evening of Ska-Punkabilly explosions and wild, wild music. You can catch Super Heavy Duty this Saturday at 10 PM as they share the stage at The Blue Parrot with Time and Distance and Meet me in The Matinee. Five bucks gets in the door for a night of killer music.

Speaking of our cameras, it was our honor that night to welcome back Steven Allen Adams, who pitched in to run camera three during Super Heavy Duty’s set. Steven has been tied up with other stuff lately but hasn’t lost a step and gave us great camera angles just like he did back when he was a junior RFC Big Shot on Episode 100.

PopCult Bonus Video

 “20 Days” by FARNSWORTH

September 14, 2014 by rudy panucci

Above you should see the music video for “Twenty Days” by the group Farnsworth. This is the official music video, heralding the release of their new album “Live It,” which will make its debut on vinyl this Saturday at Sullivan’s Records.

Sullivan’s is of course the natural place for the vinyl release party since the album was recorded there after hours over the course of a few weeks earlier this year, during the water crisis. While this will be the first in-store performance at Sullivan’s open to the public, this music has been played there before.

Later in the evening, after the Sullivan’s release party, Farnsworth will take the stage again at Sam’s Uptown Cafe.

The RFC MINI SHOW # 37

The RFC MINI SHOW starring Christopher Carter

Monday, September 8, 2014

This week’s RFC MINI SHOW features a couple of solo cover songs by Christopher Carter, who will be appearing on Radio Free Charleston in the future, performing original tunes with his band, Leech.

We recorded Christopher just last week at the Arteries Art Show, at Mike Winland Studios. We were there for the art show, and were so impressed with Christopher that we pointed the camera at him, and shot an impromptu host segment too. Since we just had one camera to point at Chris, in editing we dropped in shots from the art show, which included work by Chris Woodall, Mike and Rose Winland, Tim Shinn, Lee Harrah, Kelly Bryant, Christopher’s father, Johnny Carter (he of the impressive garden) and many others.

Because we shot the host segment on the fly, some of my words came out in a less-than communicative fashion. When I say that the show came together on the spur of the moment, I’m talking about this episode of The RFC MINI SHOW. Arteries was a success because of the hard work put in by Mike and Rose Winland and Penny Maple in the weeks leading up to the exhibit. I didn’t want to give the impression that the art show was just thrown together. I didn’t realize how clumsily I’d worded the intro until I was editing the show.

Arteries was a horror-themed art show designed to promote ShockaCon (coming in just a few short weeks) and it was a huge success, with lots and lots of folks in attendance. You’ll be reading a lot about ShockaCon in the coming weeks in PopCult. Also of note is that this show is the first episode of Radio Free Charleston or The RFC MINI SHOW where all of the camera work is by our own Melanie Larch.