Happy Birthday, Julie!

Happy birthday today to our favorite sultry songstress Julie London!

For our previous Julie London posts, click here.

Julie London on "What's My Line?"

Get Julie London!

Put the pitchforks and torches away, that's not what I meant! I meant, you can now download many of the wonderful Julie London's songs via the internet (all in .wav form, but iTunes will take 'em!). Check out the plentiful collection at JDHay's Crooners.

You can't beat anything that's free. And you certainly can't beat Julie London for free.

Hey, put the club away --- that's not what I meant by "beat'!

Blog On, Ladies. Blog On!

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly wants to know... and so I answer:

What were you doing 10 years ago?
1. working a temp job as a secretary
2. sponging off the parents
3. trolling the bars
4. driving a pickup truck with nothing automatic about it
5. generally hating life

Five Snacks You Enjoy:
1. Cracklin' Oat Bran cereal
2. Potato chips and onion dip
3. Baked tortilla chips and guacamole
4. Baked tortilla chips and salsa
5. Hummus and pita chips

Five Songs That You Know All The Lyrics To:
1. "Under Pressure" by Queen & David Bowie
2. "I'm So Excited" by the Pointer Sisters
3. "I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor
4. "'Taint What You Do" by Julie London
5. "Pop! Goes my Heart" by Hugh Grant from Music & Lyrics (couldn't resist the additional mention)

Five Things You Would Do If You Were a Millionaire:
1. Have a house in Oregon, one in Banff, and one in Hawaii
2. Move to a condo in San Francisco
3. Create a business out of my home with Pixie.
4. Pay off all my damn bills!
5. Donate to St. Jude Children Research Hospital (sorry, Pixie, I had to steal that idea. You know I love them there!)

Five bad habits:
1. Procrastinating
2. Not going to the gym
3. Losing my keys or sunglasses
4. Not doing the dishes
5. Paying bills late

Five Things You Like To Do:
1. Work on Photoshop
2. Blog
3. Surf the internet
4. Hang out with Dyno
5. Happy Hour!

Five Things You Would Never Wear Again:
1. Netted clothing
2. Mall bangs
3. Dock Martin boots
4. Stretch pants with high top sneakers
5. Two-tone socks

Five Favorite Toys
1. iPod nano
2. Cellphone (LG ENV -- best phone ever!)
3. My car
4. Playstation 2
5. My work computer (when I should be working)

Five people to tag:
1. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
2. SorryIGotDrunk
3. A Job in Hell
4. The Sneeze
5. Lilek's Bleat

Instructions: Remove the blog from the top, move all blogs up one, add yourself to the bottom.
Families Are Like Fudge
A Beautiful Life
Absolutely Bananas
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Sweepea's Lounge

Happy Anniversary, Sweepea's Lounge

Tomorrow will be our ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY, but since I'll be out of town this week due to Thanksgiving, I thought I'd post this today.

Wow!! It's been a whole year, and so much has changed! We used to be pink, and I used to be a blonde! So...taking a walk down memory lane, here's some of our momentous firsts:

First Post Eh-vah! (and first mention of Errol Flynn)
First "Va Va Voom" Star of the Day: Julie London
First Star Sighting of the Day: Sean Maguire. Now he's on that one sitcom with the guy who does that thing...
First Dumpster Drama... Act I, people!
First Must-Rent Movie: Sunset Blvd

...and as they say at the end of the birthday song: "and many more...!!" Have a happy Thanksgiving!

Julie London sings "Daddy"

Another sultry rendition by my favorite female crooner.

The Girl Can't Help It!

Here's Julie London singing "Cry Me a River," making Tom Ewell envision her lounging in his apartment. (The non-karaoke version.)

Thanks, Lou!

Julie London sings "Daddy"

Thanks to Bedazzled Blog, we can watch Julie London in all her sultry goodness.

For more of these Scopitones (the 1960's French version of MTV) visit the Scopitones Blog. It'll give you wicked flashbacks.

P.S. I love the swimsuits...and the dancing.

Julie London...Karaoke Star?

Sing along with Julie to "Cry Me a River."

Download Julie London!

Whatever Julie Wants? How about what I want?! And I want to download a Julie London album for free!

Download her album Whatever Julie Wants and listen to your heart's content! Kinda has a scratchy vinyl sound to it, but that just adds to its charm.

Thanks, These Records are BenT!

"V" for "Va Va Voom"

Apparently in the new movie V for Vendetta the one called "V" has a jones for Julie London (our former "Va Va Voom" Star of the Day):

...once V gets Evey in his underground lair, bursting with old paintings and a jukebox that plays Julie London singing ''Cry Me a River,'' you realize you're on far more familiar turf than you thought.

I hope this reflects the classy style of our dear favorite crooner...although I doubt it.

Think of it as a Clip Show...

So sick of it all that I bailed from work early to pack a bag and get the hell out of town. I'll be gone all weekend, so you'll just have to deal with reliving the dear moments that I've already posted.

Peruse to your will, but my favorite posts are:

Dumpster Drama: Act I - the one that started it all.

Sanka Saved This Family - the story of Billy, and the social worker that saved his fanny.

"Va Va Vodka" Ad of the Day - favorite vintage ad with the Lounge's favorite gal Julie London.

I Want the Name of this Decorator - the Lounge's first Design Disaster.

...Or check out the categories to the right for your favorite topics.

Enjoy! [exit theme music, mild applause]

Julie London Alert!

The popular 1972 TV drama Emergency! - that happens to star our dear favorite songstress and former "Va Va Voom" Star of the Day Julie London - is coming again to you with their Season Two DVD. It's release date is February 7th, but you can always pre-order it on Amazon.com.

(Season One was released back in August of last year. Get the two seasons for less than $70! And no, I don't work for Amazon.com.)

"Va Va Vodka" Ad of the Day

Not only does this ad have my favorite singer in it, Miss Julie London - the Lounge's first "Va Va Voom" Star of the Day - but it's for vodka for petesake!

I love you Smirnoff and AdClassix!

"Va Va Voom" Star of the Day

Julie London
Ted Naron, the music critic, writes:

The most remarkable thing about Julie London is remarkable indeed: that she used her erotic persona not so much to interpret songs as to change the nature of them to become something other than when sung someone else. Ella Fitzgerald or Sarah Vaughan or Peggy Lee may have sung the definitive version of this or that tune, but London wasn't playing the same game. This may be a function of her coming to recording only after starting a career as an actress.

Born Julie Peck in 1926, London made her first movie in 1944 and had already been a sexpot in 13 films by the year of her first album (1956). As a singer she had technical limitations, but as an actress she knew how to work within these to create a song style consistent with the seductress image - and luckily, among her many physical attributes, she had the ears to make it a highly musical style. She used her breathy, sexy, sultry voice (to use three of the most often used Julie London adjectives) not to sing a version of a song that could compete with someone else's on a scale of good to best, but to change it's meaning. [For example, her rendition of ] 'Girl Talk' changes from a piece of instruction to a piece of seduction. 'Wives and Lovers' is no longer friendly advice to a gal pal, but a threat.

London constructs these scenarios with certain stylistic tricks that may have been born of necessity. She sings in short, breath-in-your ear phrases. No disciple of Sinatra-style phrasing, London's typical unit consists of no more than three to five words, and phrases of thwo or even one word are not uncommon. She also has an interesting habit of falling off just a microtone in pitch at the end of many phrases, which has the effect of enhancing a sense of intimacy. And she almost never sings loud...It's impossible not to admire the way she uses [these effects] so musically and in the service of her persona - a persona that may have had very little to do with the real Julie Peck, but which was highly effective during a prolific mid-1950's to mid 1960's career.

Backed by various accompaniments from solo guitar to jazz combo to big band to orchestra, she is always subtly hip. Whether her jazz-flavored sensibility was shaped by her husband, songwriter/musician Bobby Troup, or whether she and Troup gravitated to each other because they both loved Jazz, is unknown. It is safe to assume that Troup had a lot to do with the various backings she performed, as he produced several of her albums, though he isn't usually credited as arranger.

Julie London fansite: Our Fair Lady
...and an Amazon.com Search of her albums

If you'd like desktop wallpapers of any "Va Va Voom" Stars, let me know - they're all made up and ready to go!